The truth is that no one will be able to say for sure whether or not the seed will sprout if you plant it with mold. Thus, in this article, we will look at how to save moldy seeds and seedlings as well as how to prevent mold from forming. You can certainly rescue some moldy seeds, but learning how to prevent this problem can eventually save a wagon of time and effort. To do so, you need to spread the affected seeds on a tray and mist them with a weak hydrogen peroxide solution. It probably works to some extent, but there is no direct scientific evidence that it will prevent damping-off in seedlings.If the seed’s outer casing is hard but covered in mold, you can try cleaning the fungus off. If you are going to use a spice to treat damping-off, cinnamon is your best choice. I doubt that very many gardeners have used controls, which means their conclusions are meaningless. There is a lot of anecdotal evidence, but we all know the value of that. Watering these would create aqueous extracts, but nobody knows if the amount of active ingredient in these extracts would be enough to reduce the growth of damping-off fungi. Gardeners sprinkle the powder onto seedlings or the surface of the soil. Essential oils are more effective than other forms of extract. The true cinnamon is more effective than the fake cinnamons. ConclusionĪll forms of cinnamon seem to suppress a wide range of fungal species including those that cause damping off. I did find one product, Cinnamite, that contained cinnamaldehyde, which is the known active antifungal agent in cinnamon, but the product is labeled for use against mites, aphids and powdery mildew, but not against damping-off. Most commercial products for damping-off contain synthetic fungicides and these products probably work well. These tests clearly show antifungal properties but they can’t be extrapolated to conclude that similar results would be obtained with potted seedlings. Many of the studies were in vitro tests that simply looked at the effect of cinnamon on fungi growing in petri dishes. Not surprisingly, the effectiveness of cinnamon to control fungi varied by species. ![]() Although a few damping-off species were tested using either alcohol extractions or essential oils (ref 2), none were tested with dry powder. Fungi Being StudiedĪ wide range of fungi were studied many have nothing to do with damping-off. I found no study that sprinkled the dry powder on the surface of the soil, which is the common method used by gardeners. One study mixed the powder with soil and found some effects. It is reasonable to expect that aqueous extracts are the lest effective. Essential oils are more effective than alcohol extracts, probably because the active ingredients are more concentrated. The latter two forms have been studied the most, probably because they contain the highest levels of organic compounds.Īqueous, essential oil ( second study) and alcohol extracts all showed antifungal properties. Studies have used four forms of cinnamon dry powder, aqueous (ie water) extraction, alcohol extraction and commercial essential oil. One study did compare the essential oils of several species and found that all of them had some antifungal properties, but some were much more effective than others. I even found one study that used a species that is not commonly used to make commercial cinnamon. Several studies do not specify the name of the species tested and in most cases only a single species was used. Unfortunately, for several reasons we can’t conclude from these studies that cinnamon, as used by gardeners, controls damping-off. At least one of the active antifungal components, cinnamaldehyde, has been well studied and there is some understanding about how it controls fungi at a chemical level. The antifungal and antimicrobial properties of cinnamon have been studied and confirmed. Which cinnamon stops damping-off? Since most reports from the general public just say cinnamon, we don’t really know which one they used. This latter one is much more expensive, and it is usually labeled correctly to justify the higher price. We do not distinguish between them, unless it is the true Ceylon cinnamon. The problem we have is that, in North America at least, almost all types are just called cinnamon. There are more fake cinnamons.Ĭinnamon is also produced from an unrelated species, Canella winterana. I’ll go with The Plant List and call it C. These last two plants are the same species and scientists have not agreed on which is the correct name. Cassia is a common name used to refer to Cinnamomum aromaticum and Cinnamonum cassia. ![]() The fake cinnamon is usually called cassia or Chinese and many sites make it sound as if cassia is a completely different type of plant.
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