I have some Nectarine stones I’d like to store in the freezer. Should I get the pips out of their stones or just wash and store the whole thing, stones and all? Mould growing in the grooves of the stone shouldn’t be an issue in the freezer right? Since the stones are there to protect the pips it seems silly to me to smash them open before I’m ready to plant.
Thanks in advance
First, extract the pit from the fruit, clean it using running water, and use a fungicide to prevent pathogens in the seed.
Alternatively, you can also dip the pit in a one-tenth solution of bleach and water. Leave the pit to dry for three to four days.
Once the pit is dry, extract the inner seed from the hard outer coating. You can use pliers or nutcrackers to crack the pit, but be alert not to break the inner seed.
After removing the inner seed, the following will be your next steps!
Collect the Peach seeds in a plastic bag and place them in the refrigerator at a temperature between 1 and 5° C.
Place the bag in the refrigerator for around four months.
After four months, pour the pit into the water for a few hours.
Close the bag tightly, and soak the seed in water for 2 to 3 hours.
Open the bag, and add all-purpose potting soil and the water title until the soil is damp.
Add more soil if the mixture is too moist, and seal the bag tightly.
After germinating the seeds, wait for the roots to grow to at least 2.5 cm long and plant the seedlings outdoors.
That came from this Ultimate Guide To Planting Peach Seeds - Plants Craze
Personally, I’d like to see research that shows the advantage of removing the kernel from the shell, but I am utterly devoid of experience sprouting peach seeds, it just doesn’t seem likely that nature hasn’t already provided the means for the shell to exist without damaging a seed’s ability to sprout.
I await the response of readers with experience.
I don’t think you should store the seeds in a freezer. Peaches are a temperate climate fruit and it is questionable the seeds can withstand temps close to 0F but perhaps it is only a matter of properly drying them before freezing them. Expanding water as it freezes can rupture cells.
I saved some pits of peaches/nectarines we ate over the summer this year. After a few weeks of drying I used a hammer to crack the outer part and extract the seeds. I have those in a ziptop plastic bag in the fridge now. Hopefully at least a few of them will germinate. They certainly take up less space this way, and… I’d say 30% or more of them were rotten, non-existent, otherwise a dud… So this way I at least know which are viable (looking) seeds and which clearly are not.
Nature stores them in a hard shell. I don’t see why cracking them out would be an advantage. I’ve got 12 Nemaguard seeds in the fridge now still in their shell in moist media for stratification. I’ll likely plant them as is in mid winter in the greenhouse. They should germinate in January as soon as it starts to warm up a bit.
There are less hazards to the seed when we’re germinating them than in nature. So cracking them out before stratification and germination can certainly work. Just for storing them I’d leave them in the shell. And I’d store in the fridge not the freezer.
You might review the process that Nathan describes I his post at
https://growingfruit.org/t/growing-wild-plum-from-seed/47786/21
I think it best resembles what nature does for germination and growing from seed.