Rosa canina 'Dog Rose'

[Ex. Co. Durham, England]

Rosaceae: deciduous Shrub growing to 3 m (9ft) by 3 m (9ft) at a very fast rate, hardy to zone 3, flowering from June to July, and the seeds ripen from Oct to December, native to hedges, scrub, woods, roadsides and banks, from Europe, including Britain, from Norway south and east to North Africa and southwest Asia.

USES:

Fruit can be eaten raw or cooked, it can be used in making delicious jams, syrups, and the syrup can be used as a nutritional supplement, especially for babies.

The petals, hips and galls have astringent, carminative, diuretic, laxative, ophthalmic and tonic properties. The hips are taken internally in the treatment of colds, influenza, minor infectious diseases, scurvy, diarrhoea and gastritis, the syrup made from the hips is used as a pleasant flavouring in medicines and is added to cough mixtures, a distilled water made from the plant is slightly astringent and is used as a lotion for delicate skins, the plant is also used in Bach flower remedies.

GROWING INFORMATION:

Dog rose seeds have a deep dormancy within them, this requires a degree of patience to overcome and it is usually quite easy to get high levels of germination if the correct methods are followed.

First prepare a free draining substrate into which the seeds are to be mixed, this can be a 50/50 mixture of compost and sharp sand, or perlite, vermiculite. The chosen substrate needs to be moist (but not wet), if you can squeeze water out of it with your hand it is too wet and your seeds may drown and die. Mix the seeds into the substrate, making sure that there is enough volume of material to keep the seeds separated. Place the seed mixture into a clear plastic bag (freezer bags, especially zip-lock bags are very useful for this -provided a little gap is left in the seal for air exchange) If it is not a zip-lock type bag it needs to be loosely tied. Then write the date on the bag so that you know when the pre-treatment was started.

The seeds of this species require a cold period to break the dormancy that is within the seeds. This dormancy is there to prevent the seed from germinating during the autumn and winter when conditions outside would be unsuitable for growth. The breaking of this is easily achieved by placing the prepared bag of seeds in the fridge at (4°C) for a period of between 12 and 16 weeks. During this time make sure that the pre-treatment medium does not dry out at any stage or it will be ineffective!

It is quite possible for the seeds to germinate in the bag at these temperatures when they are ready to do so, if they do, just remove them from the bag and carefully plant them up. When the period of pre-treatment has finished the seed should be ready to be planted. Small quantities can be sown in pots or seed trays filled with a good quality compost and cover them with a thin layer of compost no more than 1cm deep. For larger quantities it is easiest to sow the seeds in a well prepared seedbed outdoors once the pre-treatment has finished and wait for the seedlings to appear.

It has also been found that fluctuating pre-treatment temperatures that mimic the natural cycle can give the best germination results and I have myself had excellent results by keeping the mixed seeds in a cold shed through the winter for the cold stage of their pre-treatment and allowing the temperature to fluctuate naturally. Un-germinated seeds can have the cold pre-treatment process repeated again to enable more seeds to germinate.

Do not expose newly sown seeds to high temperatures (above 25°C). Keep the seedlings well-watered and weed free. Growth in the first year is usually between 15 and 30cm depending on the time of germination and cultural techniques and developing seedlings are usually trouble free. Allow them to grow for 1 or 2 years before planting them in a permanent position.

HARVESTED: 

 

APPROX. 50+ SEEDS