Ok, ginseng is grown from seed.
It probably could be propogated vegetatively,
but the regulations regarding the
harvest of ginseng require that the entire
root be harvested, so
really the only way ginseng is
propagated is through seed. Ginseng plants
generally become reproductive when the
root attains a certain size...
that could be as early as two or three
years into the growth cycle
it might be, typically in a forest, that
would be closer to eight to ten years
into a life cycle.
In a field situation where it's grown
under artificial shade
plants almost all reproductive at age two
and definitely by age three,
but there are some forest sites where
ginseng plants may be twenty, thirty or
forty years old
and never become reproductive. So it has
to do with the root being able to
achieve a certain size
before it actually starts producing flowers.
Typically when ginseng does produce
flowers
the flowers will turn into green berries
the berries are botanically called..I
believe they're called droops and they generally contain two seeds.
The dormancy mechanism of ginseng's seed is really,
pretty interesting because most plants
that have berries that ripen in the fall
of the year as does ginseng -
the berries are bright red -
Typically those berries will produce
seeds that will sprout the following
spring
but not ginseng. The seeds that are
inside the
ginseng berries will not sprout until
the spring
following the year that they were dropped...
so actually two years after they were
dropped. So,
actually it's an 18-month dormancy process Two ginseng seeds - this one's
got a smile which indicates that the
embryo
that's within the seed is fully developed.
When this seed was
harvested, it was this big...it came out of a berry, it was about that big
and the embryo had not fully developed
that embryo was probably
0.02 millimeters. Well by the time that
the seed is going to germinate eighteen
months later
that embryo will have grown from 0.02
millimeters to as much is
.20 millimeters. So there's an
embryo inside
this seed...a little, baby plant that continues
to grow
after this berry ripens. And it'll
be eighteen months before you actually
get that smile with that crack on that seed there.
So 18-month cycle from berry to the seeds
actually sprouting.
The first year, ginseng plant is a little
tiny, weak little plant... it looks like a
strawberry leaf and that's about as big
as it gets the entire first season
and if it had a good season and it's grown
well it'll produce an apical bud
which will contain the entire plant for
the second season.
The second year it may produce one small
strawberry leaf or it may produce two
leaves...
again this would be in a woodland situation
and generally in the woods by the third
or the fourth year it'll start to
produce a plant that's got three or four
compound leaves.
And again, if the conditions are right if
it's a good site by the fifth, sixth or
seventh year
that plant will indeed start to flower
and produce seeds.
It is not reproduce particularly well on
its own. Ginseng berries that ripen in
nature and fall to the ground have about
a
two or three percent chance of actually
growing into plants. If you take the time
to pick those berries and very carefully
plant them
when they're ripe you can get that
germination rate up to about 85 percent.
This particular plant that's inside
this cage which I'm gonna remove is
really very special.
Obviously it's in the fall so the
plant has already begun to senesce...
which means that the leaves have fallen
off the plant.
It's being protected because
critters such as mice or squirrels or
turkeys would come and eat the seeds.
In this case, we collected the berries off
this plant and they've been
carefully segregated and they will be
replanted to continue this genetic line
of
wild ginseng and the reason this is
so important is because it represents a
strain of wild ginseng that is really
unique in the world.
This is Catskill Mountain wild ginseng
which is considered the most valuable
ginseng
in North America and the reason for that
is because at the size and the shape the
roots. I've just unearthed a white
bud. That apical bud there contains
next year's top... as a of matter fact
the entire top for next year including
the flower stalk
is contained inside this white bud that you
can see here.
If you dissected that, much like a tulip bulb, you would see a little miniature
plant in there
tightly coiled up with the flower
bud on it and that
is the bud will open up next spring in
May
the top will grow out of it. So as long
as that white bud is healthy and happy
and intact -
pretty good chance that that root is
gonna come up next year
but as I carefully expose some of this
soil.
will see that this root which is
growing
from this rhizome is growing uphill.
So there's a second bud right there for
the second top...
it was coming off this plant. This
particular root....
if I were to dig it up and dry it
it would sell for... it could sell for as
much as several thousand dollars for
that one root
just because it is a really, really large
really unique
wild ginseng root and I can see here as I'm
exposing away portions at the
root
just how big that is. This root
will remain in the ground
so that we can collect seeds and try to
preserve the genetic strain
that produces this particular type of
ginseng root which is
as I said.. this is considered the most
valuable in the world.
So that's a gem and that's certainly
worth putting a cage around...
I mean you could take that root and
sell it for thousand dollars maybe two
thousand dollars
but then you've lost the genetics for
that particular plant.
I would estimate it's probably between
10 and 20 years old now
which is about the maximum growth rate
for ginseng during that period of time.
After age twenty,
ginseng like people tend to shrink and
as he gets into its middle age in its
senior citizen of the ginseng root it
will indeed shrink and
eventually it'll die. You know... it's not
immortal so at some point that we won't
be there but I'm hoping that
least for the next eight, ten, twelve
years...I got a 20 year lease on this
property
I'm hoping that their root will remain
there and provide us with 50 or 60 seeds
every year.