TOPIC: Best Seed Sources

Hi everyone, I'm interested in growing Ginseng, and would like some advice on where the best place would be to buy enough seed to plant an acre of land. I have done a lot of research and have been reading the forum for a while, and would like to get started planting this fall. I have several questions though. First, what time of year are ginseng seeds available for sale? When have you found to be the best time to plant it? I read that fall was best for planting, but it looks like seed goes on sale either way before or way after I've read that it should be planted. I'm kind of afraid to store a couple of thousand dollars worth of seed in my refrigerator for a long time! I'm in North Georgia and am interested in the woodsgrown method of raising ginseng. I would greatly appreciate any advice on seed buying and growing in general.
Thanks

Welcome Woodsgrown,
Typically seed is purchased in early summer to late summer for shipment in Sept or Oct. There have been many forum topics on where to buy seed. Wildgrowm.com sells seed and many have stated they have had good luck with it. Search around on this site and look for the many past discussions. I am reluctant nowadays to recommend any given suppliers. However, I am sure you can find what you are looking for on this site.
Good luck.
Latt

Agreed. Out of respect to our host we try to not send potential growers away from this site. Sales is what pays the web hosting bill. Be careful though, you would not be the first to get burned by a seed supplier. If you had a question concerning one you were thinking about buying from then we could give you some feedback possibly. Sorry we aren't of more help.

Hillhopper

Woodsgrown...

I agree with Latt and Hillhopper.

Try some seed and perhaps rootlets from Wildgrown our host but also diversify some on that and try seed from a few other good sources that have been previously been mentioned here.

You are from North GA and I am from Southern Middle TN.

I hunt wild ginseng thru until tops are down (usually first or second week in October) and then plant seed. I get a couple days off work for Thanksgiving and for Christmas and I usually take a few move vacation days around those holidays and that is when I get the bulk of my planting done.

I have planted after Christmas before, up thru January but did not have much luck with that (low germination rate).

If I were you, I would plant from around Oct 1 (if you can get seed by then), thru Christmas.

If you are interested in producing your own seed and want to cut the time required for that, you could purchase a few hundred 2 or 3 year old rootlets and have some larger plants producing seed quicker.

I created for myself a seed producing bed in the fall of 2010. It is around 5' wide by 14' long and has 40+ nice mature wild seng roots in it. It is fun to mess with and collect and plant my own berries from. When you are a ginseng addict it's nice to have your own fix nearby. I can walk just a short distance off my back yard and see 40+ nice mature 3 and 4 prongs any time I want in season.

I started planting in the Fall of 2010, and this spring will have some 3 years olds up - looking forward to that. Many of them were nice 2 prongs last year, and should have some nice little 3 prongers this year and hopefully some of them will start putting out seed this year too.

What I am growing, they way I am growing it, I call it Wild-Simulated.

I do not cultivate the soil, just rake back the leaves, scratch up the topsoil some with my leaf rake and drop the seeds, then cover it back up and let it grow completely as wild would. That is what we call wild-simulated, and it will produce roots that are indistinguishable from true wild.

Best of Luck growing down there in GA.

TNhunter

Thanks for the advice everyone, it helps to know that you can recommend Wildgrown for seed. I have one more question. I've read that Trillium is a good indicator that Ginseng would do well in an area, but does it matter what type of Trillium? There is a lot of Prairie Trillium growing around where I would like to plant, but that is the only type I've ever seen around here. Thanks, and sorry if that is a dumb question, but it would help me to know.

Woodsgrown...

You should consider buying and reading thru the book shown in the amazon link below.

www.amazon.com/Growing-Marketing-Goldens...cinals/dp/0914875426

Scott Persons book on Ginseng, Goldenseal and other Woodland Medicinals (Growing and Marketing).

I think most everyone here, that is growing, has that book and found it to be a very good source of info on all things ginseng and more.

On Pg 60 he gives a extensive list of plants that would indicate that your location would be a good place to try growing ginseng.

Trilliums are on that list. He did not give any details on which specific types of trilliums - just said \"Trilliums\".

I know where I am growing ginseng now, and it is doing well, there are some trilliums present - not high quantity, but just a few here and there.

Where my wild simulated plantings are doing best I do have Maidenhairfern present, and over the past couple of years I have focused my wild simulated plantings in areas where maidenhair fern is present. I had always noticed the MHF as being one of the best indicator plants of wild ginseng, along with bainberry and a few othes.

Anyway... after Scott gives a rather extensive list of plants that can indicate that a location is worth trying (whic includes trilliums)... He goes on to say this.

Some of these companion plants are \"Calcicoles\" (normally growing in calcereous soils) and need conditions nearly identical to ginseng and he then listed Maidenhair Fern, yellow ladies slipper, bainberry, and blue cohosh.

Ginseng thrives --- in soils that are high in calcium and the list of Calcicoles he provided are the same way and indicate locations that have good levels of calcium in the soil.

If you have healthy reproducing wild ginseng growing in the location you are considering planting - that is the absolute best indicator.

If you don't --- but have some of the Calcicoles growing there - good sign that you will have success there.

If you do or don't have Calcicoles growing at your proposed location - I would recommend a soil test. Just rake off the top inch of soil, and collect samples from the next 4\" or so of soil. Collect several samples from the area you are thinking of planting, and mix them together and then send in a soil test sample from that mix.

What you want is a faily low PH - around 5.5 would be Ideal and Calcium levels in the 2000 ppa or higher (up in the 4000-6000 would be sweet).

Below is a picture of MHF and there is some Mayapple in there too.

TNhunter

Below is bainberry..

In the fall - it will sport a white berry that resembles a dolls eye.

Below is a pic of a bunch of MHF...

I saw them from the bottom of that hill and walked up there to check that area out because they are very good indicators for ginseng.

Look just up the hill and to the left of that MHF... a couple of real nice old ginseng plants.

TNhunter

My best advice to any new grower is to start small. Ginseng is a finicky plant. I would recommend buying only about one pound of seed to start with and dividing that up into 10 -15 equal parts and planting that many test plots on different parts of your potential growing site. See which test plots do the best and then plant larger plantings close to these the following year.. You can keep increasing your planting efforts in the future, but you may just be wasting time and money if you are planting in areas that the plant just doesn't like.

Some may view me as a pessimist, but truly I'm just a realist trying to offer sound advice..

Good Luck to you:)

woodsgrown,

What I would do starting out is find the best location you have.
That would be a north facing slope, especially in Georgia.
A good slope for drainage, that's a must.
Try to find the richest and loosest soil possible and shade that has poplar and maple trees.
I'd plant sparingly, 6 to 8 seeds per square foot because it's going to self thin anyway.
If you end up in a few years with a nice mature plant per square foot that's great!

good luck,
rootman