Flowers Bloom on 121-Year-Old Seeds
E A S T L A N S I N G, Mich., Nov. 25 -- Seeds buried by a botanist 121 yearsago have bloomed into bright yellow flowers on mullein plants.
In 1879, botany professor William Beal put seeds in 20 glassbottles and buried them on the campus of what is now Michigan StateUniversity. He wanted to see how long the seed would continue togerminate.
He directed the bottles to be dug up every five years. To extendthe experiment, the intervals were lengthened to every 10 and thenevery 20 years.
15th of 20 Bottles
Last April, the 15th bottle, containing 1,050 seeds, wasunearthed, and the seeds were set out in a growth chamber.Twenty-five seedlings, nearly all moth mullein, grew. They are nowin greenhouses.
The plants recently started blooming.
“It’s a beautiful, bright yellow flower,” said Frank Telewski,curator of the W.J. Beal Botanical Garden and an associateprofessor at Michigan State.
Five of Beal’s buried bottles remain, with the next scheduled tobe dug up in 2020, the Detroit Free Press reported today.
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