TOPIC: Seedlings with rhizome

Was checking deer cams this weekend and stopped in on one of the ginseng sites and thought this was pretty cool.

Several of the tiny roots were exposed.

Would one like this survive or should I have covered it with soil? We have had heavy rains this year so im not sure if they should look like this up to this point or if some of the soil got washed away. This was the only one I saw that was so far exposed.

JohnB,
Looking at your pictures makes me think that when you planted your seeds that you raked the leaves back and just dropped the seed. After that, you may have walked over them to make contact with the soil. I am a little skeptical about planting seeds like that on any type of terrain that has any slope at all. Even planting them after working the soil a little and covering them, followed by walking the seed down to tamp them into the soil can allow seed to float to the top in real hard rain events. They will then migrate downslope to a point where they are stopped by roots or some obstacle.
I would suggest going back over your plantings and covering the plants gently with some dirt and leaves. Those rhizome tops are a good snack for any critter coming along. Here is what some of mine looked like that I planted on a slope this winter.

Will do Hugh and thanks for the suggestion.

As far as how I planted you pretty much hit the nail on the head after the first 2k seeds which I planted one by one. I will say a majority of my plantings look pretty similar to the one you posted tho. Just this one location where I took these pics was in a low spot on the hill and the runoff water from all this crazy rain we have been getting had taken the leaves and I assume some soil with it. I may try to move these plants next fall if they make it that long.

Would you recommend abandoning rake and scatter on a slope then? Im planting on a river bluff basically so planting on flat ground is really not an option.

Thanks again for the reply.

JohnB,
I believe if I was going to be planting on a bluff where most of the ground is going to be steep, I would do some sort of planting that is across the slope instead of up and down like most experts advise to do. That will help, and making some sort of trench row, \"not more than 1 inch deep\", will help with holding things in place when you do get lots of rain. If you're going to make it some type of bed, I would cover the whole thing with sticks to keep everything where you started it. Good luck.

Hugh