Sweet Peppers

I got rid of my small pepper plants a few weeks ago, they were still cropping and actually looked pretty good.
It was just about making space for overwintering stuff that made me give up on them.

 

Okay, it's December! I'm going to test-sow the sweet pepper varieties that didn't germinate last year.

I already have heat and light going for my two micro dwarf tomato plantlets so if I do manage to get anything to germinate, it's no hassle to add the capsicums to the existing set-up.

So, into plastic bags of moist tissue and thence into the airing cupboard, go Violet Sparkle, Pasilla Bajio, Frosty, Mohawk, Lada and Doe Hill.

 

Peppers harvested at beginning of november finally ripened. Weve been eating nothing but peps after buying a bunch of giant exotic white ones on a whim at a reading fruit stall. They taste ok.
Plants are sitting in the attic by a window till spring, but im not sure theyre worth the garden space. The cultivar someone recommended me was "Gypsy" an f1 hybrid, RHS has a page but theyre all greenhouse peps.

Meanwhile the 2 of 6 Bequinhos that had shot up more than the others and fruited early... are making suspiciously *large* fruit. Hmm. We will see by February perhaps.

If anyone wants to get into sweet peppers and has some room there is certainly room for an outdoor british landrace, seemingly there is a gap for this. Peps have about 10% natural crossing rate though so youd need to cross manually. Id focus on cold growth, height and early fruiting. DM me if you want some info on Landraces.

 

King of The North is supposed to be for outdoors here, but didn't really get a move on with fruiting until I found space to move it into the greenhouse.

It wasn't much of a year for peppers, but my most decent performers were Bogdan, Victoria and Lidl Snack peppers.

 

My sowing hasn't got off to the best start. From the December sowing of around twenty seeds, I got a stunning ONE plantlet. I think I made the tissue a bit too wet and the seeds rotted. So I re-tried, putting the seeds in wet tissue on the hot water tank for a few days, then transferring them to little "teabags" of compost in the propagator. Four new seedling so far. I've just sown two of my Ukraine sweet-with-touch-of-heat peppers (from The Seed Detective) to add to the selection. Fingers crossed!

 

Perhaps try the initial wetting with boiling water to sterilise it. Ive not had issues of seed rot with that method but then the paper tended to dry out a bit which also hurt germination
Best of luck with your currant batch. Perhaps Ill start mine soon.

 

I've had them dry out, too, so I was probably overcompensating.

 

odd. i have used cinnamon as an antifungal agent before and it seems to work. but ive not had much success with the paper method anyway, probably due to the drying out issue. Last year we used these funny dehydrated pods that you soak in water and they seemed to work really well, if a bit expensive. Ive been digging up 2 year old ones from the garden so that paper? coating doesnt seem to degrade well. I have coir I purchased directly but nothing germinates in that stuff either...
Who knows.

 

I did the paper towel method last year again and it worked great. Fully soak kitchen paper, squeeze out, fold into quarters, put seeds on, fold over again, put in plastic sandwich bag to retain moisture and stick in the airing cupboard. Check daily. Checking includes opening the bag and paper towel so I guess it helps air it a bit. I think I rewetted a couple of times too

Maybe it's not the best method if the seeds are a bit old or a variety that takes longer to germinate?

Looking at last year's notes, 7 days half had germinated, 10 days all had germinated

 

It was lovely, fresh seed, so I can only think that I over-wetted. I now have five plantlets/seedlings, so another couple and I'm sorted.

 

A domestic hotwater tank should be at around 65 deg C, far too hot for seed germination I think?
It needs to be this hot to prevent legionaires disease etc. However, storage in that cupboard should give a better chance.

 

I often germinate seeds in the airing cupboard, either in pots or I plastic bags.
But they are on a shelf about 6ins above the tank.
Directly on the tank would be too hot but I think it depends on how much lagging you have on the tank.

 

It's not touching the (well lagged) tank. Worked well last year, bar a few dry-outs, so I can only put it down to overcompensating on the moisture.

 

Mini Lidl, Victoria, Pasilla Baijo and Redskin all popping up nicely now.

 

4 quid for 8 seeds, they better be good.