Plant hormones called Gibberellins have been successfully used to shorten and even eliminate the dormancy periods of some seeds, however, they also frequently have other effects, such as stimulated growth and alteration of sex expression. The only way to determine if it will work with D. americana is to try it and see what happens.

The common method for dealing with this type of dormancy is called cold stratification. Refrigerate the seeds in damp paper towels for the prescribed period, and follow with normal indoor seed starting.

Winter sowing will provide essentially the same service, outdoors, but under controlled conditions. See the Winter Sowing Forum for details.