How to plant bamboo cypress seeds

Seed harvesting

The fruits of bamboo cypress usually mature in November, but some of them bloom and bear fruit twice a year, and the fruits mature in March. The mother trees for seed collection should be 20-50 years old, free of pests and diseases and in good growth. The fruits can be harvested when the skin of the fruits turns from green to yellow. The collected fruits should be placed in a cool and ventilated place and will be fully ripened after about 10-20 days. When the peel turns purple and the flesh becomes soft, wash off the flesh, dry the seeds in the shade and then you can sow them. Or you can adopt the sand stratification method, covering a layer of seeds with a layer of sand. Each layer is generally about 10 cm thick and the total height should not exceed 1 meter. The seeds can be taken and sown in the spring of the second year.

Sowing and seedling raising

It is suitable to choose fertile sandy loam with short sunshine, convenient water source and good permeability as the bed for seedling cultivation. Make deep trenches and high beds, dig trenches on the beds and sow seeds at random. The trench spacing is about 25 cm, the trench depth is 3 cm, and the seed spacing is generally about 5 cm. Usually 15 kg of seeds are used per mu.

After sowing, a shade shed needs to be built with a light transmittance of about 30%-50%. At the same time, during the management process, weeding, loosening the soil, and topdressing and irrigation should be carried out in time. When the seedlings are 20-30 cm tall in the same year, they can be planted in the nursery. If they are used as street trees, it is best to keep them in the nursery for 1-2 more years.

Management after sowing

After sowing in the same year, it is necessary to do work such as inter-row cultivation, weeding, and topdressing. If there is drought, water should be applied to reduce the temperature, and at the same time, grass should be covered to conserve moisture. After that, 1-2 tillage and weeding will be required every year until the bamboo cypress grows into a dense forest or grows to a height of more than 3 meters. In addition, the bamboo cypress needs to be shaped and pruned to maintain a good tree shape and improve its ornamental value.