So I am super excited for autumn because I will travel to the the northwest of Tunisia (my country) to observe the wildlife and hopefully add many native plants and fungi to my life list.
One of my goals for this trip is to ethically collect a few seeds of native plants that pollinators like to replant back at home as part of a reforestation project I am attempting.
I am usually able to tell what a plant is very quickly on the spot thanks to inaturalist, so I can figure out if its native or not and decide whether I want to take it or not.
So the chance of finding a suitable native species is already slim, but even if I do, I still have to find it fruiting and figure out whether the fruits are ripe enough to germinate or not, I feel like this is the most difficult part of the process because this kind of information about obscure wild species is very rare to find.
I started worrying about this when I found a caperbush near my house that was fruiting, I was so excited to pick off a few fruits to try and grow it at home so I looked up what caperberries are supposed to look like and picked out ones that looked like that, but it turns out most fruits on the internet show the stage where the fruit can be pickled and eaten so it wasn’t ready yet for harvest :(
So the chance of this happening again during my trip is higher because I will be unfamiliar with the place and its vegetation.
Some of the plants I want to pick are easier to tell (Cork Oak) while others are more obscure like ( Agrimonia eupatoria) and the hardest ones to tell would be ones that I would discover on the spot because I wouldn’t have time to do research like I do at home.
This is more of a rant than anything since I don’t think resources exist to assist for this specific use case, but let me know if you faced this issue as well on your observation trips.
You could at least try filtering it’s photos on the iNat taxon page to “fruits and seeds” and then see what variation those photos show. For example, if some show red or black fruits, it’s usually safe to say that green fruits are not ripe.
Other than that it’s a matter of guessing. Many fleshy fruits turn soft when ripe, so if you can easily press a fingernail into the flesh, that’s a good sign.
Many pods or capsules turn brown and dry out when ripe, and will often make a rattling sound.
Those are the things I would go by if I were guessing about unfamiliar plants.
This sounds like an interesting project, but I would add a word of caution to be sure to check the legality of importing seeds/fruits prior to doing so. In many instances, this can be illegal (sometimes on the export side, more often on import). I’ve seen people get caught with fruits during international travel, and the results have ranged from minor inconvenience to seemingly serious inquisition.
Many species are still capable of ripening to viable seeds from “green” fruit/capsules/pods. In fact in my experience this can often be the best time to collect as in the wild the fruit are regularly consumed or parasitised over time. My advice is to experiment and see for yourself. Open the fruit and look for the seeds. Have they formed? Are they soft or have a hard coat? Should they? This can affect the mode of germination and pretreatments. Some of this kind of information is available in the primary literature but I agree it is harder to find.
Learning the rhythm of plants and when they flower and fruit takes time. Some (e.g. bulbs) are even difficult to find when not in flower and you will need to develop your eye. In a mediterranean context it is somewhat likely that the seeds will await colder and wetter conditions before wanting to germinate, which is probably now in your autumn.
@roadside_rambler This is good advice, especially for the rattling sound in legumes as I have experience with that because I grow moringa but I never intentionally thought about it as meaning the fruit is ripe
This reforestation project is also in Tunisia but its in the northeast near the capital, so I won’t be traveling across countries. and even though it might not be illegal to pick seeds from these areas I still want to be responsible and pick only enough to propagate the plant at home and leave enough to allow the plant to spread its seeds on its own.
Regarding the difference in micro-climate, this is another concern I have, the northwest is more humid and has more rainfall per year than the northeast, so many plants might not survive the harsher climate even though they are technically native to this region. this is something I am still actively researching, its difficult because where I live there are no old growth forests and the entire area has been taken over by agriculture and urban development.
Note: I can share more info about this project if people are interested
@pdwhugo This is very interesting and in retrospect I should have at least gave that caperbush berry a try at growing because I had nothing to lose anyways.
