TOPIC: season opener

What state is everyone from, and when does your season open?

I'm from OHIO, and we don't get started until Sept. 1st.

Ky Aug 15

Indiana is September 1.

Missouri, Sept.1

Tennessee - Aug 15 (will it ever get here ?)

TNhunter

Guys our seaon opener as I stated is Aug 15,but im concerned with the fruit.I went out and looked at some seng not to far from home and the pods are just starting to fill out good with small berrys in them and some of the berrys are barely seeable,I do not think that they will be ripe by Aug 15,,and if not then I may not get to start on Aug 15th,I would for sure want the fruit ripe for replanting before digging,cause to be honest im jonesing to go digging lol,so I am going to keep my fingers crossed and hope that they are ripe,or at least some are ripe and then return for the others mature plants.If we do not let the fruit ripeing we are hurting ourselves.

Good post Billy...Jonesing! LOL Join the club!

Vt...Aug 20

Billy,

I have the same problem as you - In Tennessee the season opens Aug 15 and a lot of the plants we find that first week or two have full size berries but they are still green.

I always plant them anyway - hoping they may come up - I was never really sure if they had to be red/ripe to actually germinate when planted. You know how you can pick tomatoes green in the fall before frost and they will ripen later on - I wonder if green ginseng seed will do that ?

In Scotts book he says that in the Natural Setting less than 1% of ginseng seeds survive, germinate, grow to maturity and in turn reproduce. WOW that is a slim chance.

I am sure that when we pick those red berries and plant them and cover with leaves they have a much better chance of making it than if they just fall off the plant naturally.

Later on he mentions success rates for germination of stratified seed being very high (in the 50-85% or even higher range).

I notice that wildgrown says their stratified seed is available for shipping Late August.

But they say seed can be planted as early as Mid August.

I expect that while still hot and dry you would need to make sure and plant them at least 1/2 inch deep to keep them from drying out.

Anyway if you could get some stratified seed and plant them when harvesting plants that do not have ripe berries yet in the early part of the season - that would be a good alternative. It sounds like they would have a better chance of surviving and germinating than ripe/red berries would.

I guess you might have to find somewhere other than wildgrown to buy them from - since they are not available until late august.

TNhunter

LoL Maya it aint mutch longer....

Tnhunter you know I can not truly answer that the green seed would or would not germinate and reproduce even if they are full in the pod,I have never tryed that but I may try that with 8 or 10 seeds in my personal patch this season to see for myself,in fact I can spare that many seeds,so im going to try it and see.

I have an update on the seng in the wild over hear in our area.Just a few days ago I was realy concerned about the open day and the fruit of Aug 15 ,but my soninlaw had the day off and he asked me if I felt like going hikeing through the woods a bit.I told him that I wanted to check a couple old spots on the mountian that I hadent been to in awhile maybe 3 or 4 years now.These hollers are only about 4 miles from the ones I went and looked at last week,and what a difference in the berrys Chris (my soninlaw) got bragging rites on our visit to the forest because he found a nice 4 prong with red berrys about 4 or 5 already red in the pod,I was so very happy.Also over there in the area we found 19 0r 20 other nice 4 prongs that have prety much fully develpoed pods of nice green berrys,they should be red by Aug 5th or so and by the 15th dead ready for replanting.so this area will be digable on opening day I do believe.So we will going on that area of the mountians the first couple of digs the good Lords will. Ive added a photo of Chris beside the 1st one bunch to have red fruit this year,also I added another of two nice 4`s that have develpoed pods that will be red bty season.

That holler is going to have a 2 or 3 pounds of very nice matuure seng for this year I have dug in this area for years and once again,stewardship proves to be more than satisfying to this ole boy.I wish with all of my heart that others could understand this.I will leave a pound or more of 3 prongers in this area,and replant seeds everywhere even a few of my own.

My dealer has told me that this will be a good year for selling and he has never missed it once in all the years weve been friends.So I will sit my goal at 10 pd of dry wild seng once again if I can get the time from work.Last year some of you know I fell short of that goal by 9 ounces with my weigh in at 9lb 7oz.

So g/luck to you all guys and I hope you have a very good year in the wild,as the price will be good for wild seng this season.