Seeding to establish rare plants in the wild

[Heather Schneider]

Hi everyone,

I have a few projects where we are seeding rare plants back into the wild – if you’re using wild-collected seeds from your seed bank or nursery-produced seeds (e.g., from seed bulking at your garden), do you treat your seeds with anything for biosecurity before sowing them in natural settings? For example, do you treat with fungicide, insecticide, bleach or anything else to decrease the odds of introducing pests or pathogens to wild settings for either augmentation, reintroduction or translocations?

I am thinking of this both for our work on California’s Channel Islands as well as a plant that grows in riparian areas on the mainland. I’m especially concerned about whether any pathogens could travel from the nursery to the wild site and be likely to spread in the riparian zone.

Thanks for your help!

Heather

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