42 
PACIFIC SCIENCE, Vol. V, January, 1951 
Norfolk Island pine seed 
The germination behavior of the seed of 
Norfolk Island pine in storage at various rela- 
tive humidities and temperatures is presented 
in Figure 4. At room temperature, no matter 
what the storage condition, the longevity of 
the stored seed was very short (Fig. 4). At 
this temperature, open storage seemed to be 
slightly superior to the other types of storage. 
At 59° F., the lower relative humidities, 
especially the 45 per cent, preserved the via- 
bility of the seed better than the higher hu- 
midities. At 45° F., the most striking occur- 
rence was the position of the 30 per cent 
relative humidity curve. As a storage medium, 
this humidity was inferior to all the other 
storage media. The 60 per cent relative hu- 
midity at 45° F. seemed about the optimum 
storage medium, with the 75 per cent hu- 
midity a close second. In general, up to a 
GERMINATION DATE 
Fig, 4. The effect of temperature and relative humid- 
ity on the viability of stored Norfolk Island pine seed. 
relative humidity of 75 per cent, the higher 
the humidity, the better the seed kept in a 
viable state. At a relative humidity of 90 per 
cent, the seed did not keep any better than 
that in open storage. Though inferior to the 
60 and 75 per cent relative humidities, the 
airtight storage was superior to the open stor- 
age for maintaining the longevity of the seed 
at 45° F. 
When the graphs in Figure 4 are superim- 
posed, it will be seen that, in general, the 
germination curves of the seeds stored at 45° 
F. lie above those of the seeds stored at 59° F. 
and that the latter curves in turn lie above 
those of the seeds stored at room temperature. 
Thus it seems that regardless of the storage 
medium, the lower the temperature, the 
longer was the seed kept in a viable condition. 
From the above considerations, it seemed 
that storing the seed of Norfolk Island pine 
at a relative humidity of 60 per cent at 45° F. 
extended the germinative life of this seed. 
Mamani seed 
In Figure 5 is presented graphically the 
germination behavior of the seed of mamani 
in storage under various conditions. Unfor- 
tunately, shortage of seed supply necessitated 
the termination of some germination tests 
before the experiment was concluded. As a 
result, in these instances, accurate compari- 
sons between the different storage media 
could not be made. Nevertheless, it seems 
that in open storage this seed remained viable 
for an extended period of time even at room 
temperature. At the lower temperatures of 
45° and 59° F., open storage was probably 
superior to the other storage media. 
When all the storage media are taken into 
consideration, it seems that as a whole the 
lower temperatures of 45° and 59° F. were 
slightly superior to room temperature in 
maintaining the longevity of mamani seed 
(Fig. 5). These low temperatures were equally 
effective in prolonging the viability of this 
seed. 
From the above considerations, it followed 
