Wasn’t Johnno, was me back in 2017
Is still relevant to Sydney as I still wasn’t stratifying and was still sowing early march (just had moved outside) and things just germinated from roughly April onwards every year. Winter doesn’t stop germination in Sydney, everything after germination (like developing true leaves and growing) slows down though. I did give up on forestry tubes (I got lazier!) and just use planter troughs (ie, sowed directly, left to grow until culling or potted on, sometimes they’d be in the planter trough for a year)
Since then, I’ve moved to Melbourne (ish) end of last year, did the same thing (sow in March) some things (polys/hybrd musks) germinated as usual, but everything stop in winter and has only in the last week or so picked up again (germinations from rugosa, centiflolia, moderns, etc). Unsure what the difference is, things are colder here but not significantly so, some frosts but still relatively nothing. Could just be the location of the seedling bed (more shaded than in Sydney) or that it was all “new” soil/compost/etc rather than partly reused (so bacteria and things may be missing) …but not sure at this point (maybe next year will be different and may be able to rule out one of the above)
Because of how big Australia is, things are likely to vary though, stratifying in Sydney seemed pointless, there was never a lack of germination and I still had more seedlings than room to sort through each year. I had pretty much every class and species available in Australia (notable exception being Gallica, was never game enough to try because of chill requirements for blooming and just lack of chill in Sydney…have acquired 1 here in Melb, so will find out next year when I sow it’s seed in March) and there wasn’t anything that didn’t germinate from straight sowing, somethings germinate faster than others.
Thing to note, harvested seed are harvested pretty much as soon as hips are ready so likely very limited chemical inhibitors. Unsure how seed that have been sitting in hips for the whole of winter would fair, may have absorbed a lot of inhibitors, may not be a problem, not something I’ve explored. If it’s just exploratory for you though I’d just split it, half direct sow, half stratify…if nothing else you’ll get to see if there’s any difference and may just end up realising you don’t need to do extra steps (if you don’t have to make chores for yourself it’s a plus)
Stratifying may increase germination or uniformity of it but I haven’t encountered the need for it.