Maybe an old seed can "start" the job, but not "finish"?

A customer has a question or concerns and I hope we can get some opinions on it, thanks

“I still have a few seeds from my previous order. I placed them in water for 24-48 hours till I saw the tap root appear after seed split, but after placing in starter soil, nothing after 3 weeks. Is this “typical”? I see many questions about seed life. These are 2+ years old, but have been stored in refrigerator in small containers, and they did start, just won’t come out of soil. As far as storing previously purchased seeds, they were stored in refrigerator in tinted old medicine containers (tinted yellow-ish) with tight cap and with at least one of the silica packets inside. Allowing that these seeds were 2+ years old, I have read many articles/blogs about “how long can you keep seeds” and have yet to see a definitive answer, I am thinking maybe somewhere in that 2-2+ range? The absolutely insane part is, I am 64 years old and have done this before. When seeds were pre-soaked for 24 -36 hr at room temp.using distilled water that had been previously boiled but now room temp, all 8 seeds ABSOLUTELY cracked their shell, and showed tap roots. I then very carefully placed all in good seed starter soil, under either a 500w HPS or 600w full spectrum LED…and nada. I lightly mist every morning so as to not over water, and have lights approx 2” above seeds. Maybe an old seed can “start” the job, but not “finish”? Just curious if you guys had heard this before. Any ideas would help."

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I would think if It cracked showed a tap root it should have started
You don’t need that much light either to start seeds ?
I just keep soil moist and put a dome over mine and have started seeds older than yours ??
Not sure what else can be said besides soil to moist will kill tap root

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I just lost a seedling to over watering. Just when you think you know what your doing, smack too the back of the head. Seedlings are so delicate, and so easy to kill .

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