Abstract: To ascertain the germination characteristics of red beech seed and the growth law at seedling stage under different conditions, and to improve the germination rate of seeds, six treatments were set up in this study, including GA3 soaking, concentrated H2SO4 soaking, water bath with different temperatures, stratification-field temperature-changing stratification, different substrate treatments and the control (CK). The results showed that: (1) the red beech seeds from Changzhou dipped in water had the highest germination rate of 100%, the highest germination rate of dry seeds from Changzhou sown in vermiculite was 93.33%; (2) dipped in water for four days and had water bath of 60℃ for 20 min, the ground diameter of the red beech reached up to 14.55 mm, and the minimum ground diameter was 6.08 mm when the concentration of GA3 was 50 mg/L; (3) with stratification treatment, the highest nursery stock of red beech collected from Shuyang Jiangsu was 116.80 cm, the lowest nursery stock was 70.50 cm when the seeds dipped in water for four days and had a water bath of 60℃ for 30 min. Taken together, different treatments had significantly different effects on the germination rate, seeding height, ground diameter, germination index and vigor index. Therefore, different treatments should be handled according to different needs.