Which traits are reliably true on young seedlings?

[kaylyred]

I'm having fun raising my first batch of seedlings. As I'm looking at them, I'm wondering how true they will stay to what they're looking like today. Some of my favorites have round or cordate leaves. Some have heavy substance. One is already three times the size of all the others (although it's plain green.) Some look to have a very upright habit. One even appears to have red petioles. I hate to cull something that's potentially going to be a nice hosta later (if not necessarily one unique enough to register.) After all, I have friends with plenty of room for green, unnamed hostas.

I'm curious as to what the experience of those of you who raise seedlings has been. Which traits seem to remain true on seedlings? Do ovate leaves stay ovate? Does an upright-looking hosta stay upright? Do the seedlings with heavy substance now seem to grow up having heavy substance later? Is an early growth spurt in any way an indication of vigor or adult size?

Keep in mind that the hostas I'm talking about are around 8 weeks old now, have just recently been potted up from individual cells in a flat to their own small pots, and have between 2 and 8 leaves.

I know, I know...so many questions. But I want to learn.

[viktoria]

Hostas that appear upright in pots may be so only because of lack of horizontal space. Substance is likely to remain, whereas a seedling with thin leaves is not likely to develop substance. I first cull for substance: any thin-leaved seedlings get tossed, regardless of color or pattern.

Viktoria

[kaylyred]

Thanks, Viktoria! That's great to know.

[ViolaAnn]

I agree. Thanks, Viktoria.

I've grown a number of my seedlings and that reminds me, now that I'm back from a trip I need to get some started THIS year. Didn't want to saddle a neighbour with caring for them.

I've had a couple of seedlings from 'Outhouse Delight' that carry the same trait of emerging white and I don't think that will change. I also have one that became variegated in the 2nd year and has retained the variegation. I think red or reddish petioles will remain.

Ann

[Linda P]

Hi, Karen! I don't know if there's much of anything that you can rely on to stay the same with young seedlings,
other than substance. If a small seedling has a white back, it seems likely to stay. Colors can change...
many that turn out to be nice blues start out green. I had three cups of seedlings this year that seemed, as
they came up, to be nicely colored yellows. Almost all of them turned out not to have enough chlorophyll to
survive and died before they were past the first two leaves. I guess the main thing you can rely on is that
you will see many things change in the first few years. That's what makes it so much fun for me!

Linda P

[viktoria]

I have made the same observations, Linda (green to blue, yellows fading out).

Viktoria

[kaylyred]

Thanks for the input! I'm keeping an eye on a few that seem to have some nice substance and just seem...interesting. It's clear to e that eventually I'm going to have to cull some or give them away to folks who don't mind nurturing a seedling to see what becomes of it.

I have at least one streaker that's looking interesting. It's my rock star, even though the streaking is subtle.

[paul_in_mn]

Here's a Komodo Dragon Seedling in 2010(bottom) and 2011(top) where edges and color have changed in a year. I hope both intensify even more in future years.

[GrannyNanny]

Very light yellows nearly always die before they get more than four leaves. I let them grow, just in case there's one that will get bigger, but I've never found one that does. Light green leaves can get yellower after a year or two, and very dark green ones stay dark. I have about ten seedlings from my last year's registry "Dark Matter", and they are all pretty much dark as, or darker than, their parent. I had a whole tray of those seedlings, and they were all the same dark shade of green -- nothing else showed up there. Green can turn into blue, or blue-green, but I think that the bluish shade is usually discernible right from the two-leaf stage, although it may get more blue as it gets older. Phyllis

[Linda P]

I gave a cup of all-green Skylight seedlings to a friend a couple of years ago. She was just excited to get them and grow them on.
I did not look at them when I visited her garden last year, but this year she brought me over right away to show them to me.
There are about 5 or 6...2 of them are nice blue, and one is yellow! Yup, a yellow Skylight seedling. No chance that she put anything
else in there...she made sure to keep them separate so she would know. I told her that I will need to get a piece of that yellow Skylight
seedling back when it's big enough. It just blew my mind to see that.

Linda P

[ViolaAnn]

I guess that also shows why you might want to grow them for a couple of years.

I've been growing 2 seedlings from 'First Frost' - seed from 2008, I think. One is blue and the other yellow.

[Linda P]

Ann, you are right about that! I had so many Skylight seedlings that I had to pass some of them on. Ideally I would grow everything for a few years....it's amazing what they can do at 4 and 5 years out, but there just isn't enough room to keep all of the ones I grow. I culled very heavily early this year, and still have a few hundred out there that need to go in the ground. before I can plant them, I need to sort through and relocate the seedlings from 2 years ago. My husband laughs at me...cannot figure out why I would want to doa ll that work! He really doesn't understand that I don't see it as work at all. Well, maybe when the thermometer goes over 100 as it did a couple days ago. No way I'm going to be out there digging and moving plants in that!!!

Linda P

[ViolaAnn]

I've only just planted my seeds this year. Very late, but we'll see what happens.

Last year I had scads of them. Put them all into styrofoam cups labelled by pod parent. In mid-June, I was honored to have the Ontario Hosta Society tour my garden. I set out about 80 seedlings in cups on my front step and let people help themselves. They went like hotcakes. LOL

[Angel3K]

Hi Ann,

I'd probably join the tour just to get one of those "hot cakes". I will keep OHS in my scheduler. Love to see a growing hosta from tiny to become mature.

I made like 10 divisions of a gallon hosta from the nursery. It seems to have too many small babies, so I hosed it all down, untangle the roots and divide the small babies(cut them with roots as possible) and i put them in small pots and see how it grows. The biggest portion was potted in an 8" pot for my indoor hosta collection.

Also, I notice that there was a small hosta growing under my rose plant in the front yard. I asked my neighbor about it, and she said there was a hosta plant in the front garden, however the previous owner dug it up. Can hosta grow from leftover roots, or was this from seedling that fall down from previous years?
( I will take a picture of this tiny little baby hosta tomorrow. )

Note: I'm enjoying my backyard garden, the Kifukurin was divided into 2 clumps: one was put inside a pot and become a houseplant, and the other clump went into my garden bed.

Angie

[ViolaAnn]

Actually Angie, we are getting quite a bit off topic for this thread. I'm going to copy your message and start a new thread in the regular hosta forum.

Ann