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Tatts' first time growing anything from seed

[SIZE=10.5pt]I have never grown anything from seed before, nevermind had much of a garden. My very limited gardening experience is a couple of herbs, Mint and Parsley, which are 2 plants that you almost can't kill. I also have some Rosemary plants that were in the house when we bought it and a Lemon Tree that we recently purchased and have put in a pot. [/SIZE]
[SIZE=10.5pt]My experience with chilli plants is limited, I [/SIZE]bought a few chilli plants (not even sure what they are, Thai variety of some type) from a market and I have kept them alive for about a month so far.
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[SIZE=10.5pt]Since I have no idea what I’m doing, any advice along the way would be much appreciated. I am in Melbourne, Australia and we have a temperate climate. Winter (June-August) night time temps occasionally get below 0°[/SIZE] (Celsius) and in Summer our hottest day for the year will be low to mid 40’s.
 
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[SIZE=10.5pt]I love chillies so when I found this site and the opportunity to get some seeds from members, I jumped at the chance.[/SIZE]
 
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[SIZE=10.5pt]Thanks to JungleRain and his huge seed list and [/SIZE]Micca for his seasoning pepper seeds I had 6 strains to plant last night. I purchased a heated mini greenhouse and some peat pellets on the weekend in anticipation of planting all the seeds once they arrived.
 
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[SIZE=10.5pt]Initially I put some water in a bucket, soaked the peat pellets and placed 6 seeds from each variety in warm cups of water. After about an hour I plugged in the greenhouse so it would start warming up - first mistake - and then drained the pellets, placed them in the mini greenhouse tray and then added 2 seeds per pellet.[/SIZE]
 
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[SIZE=10.5pt]I planted 3 pellets each of:[/SIZE]
 
  • [SIZE=10.5pt]Seasoning Peppers[/SIZE]
     
  • [SIZE=10.5pt]Bahamian Goat Pepper[/SIZE]
     
  • [SIZE=10.5pt]Fatalii Yellow[/SIZE]
     
  • [SIZE=10.5pt]Antillais Caribbean[/SIZE]
     
  • [SIZE=10.5pt]Habanero Giant White[/SIZE]
     
  • [SIZE=10.5pt]Habanero Chocolate[/SIZE]
     
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[SIZE=10.5pt]I knew I had to have them correctly labelled else I would struggle to know which one was which so I also bought some white plant marking things. I wrote the names of each seed on the sticks and put them behind the pellets. I spaced them out across the trays - second mistake - in front of their respective markers.[/SIZE]
 
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[SIZE=10.5pt]All done I wanted to take a photo of the greenhouse with everything finished. I had it on the bench and there was a few other things around so I thought I'd move it to a clear spot for a better photo. Remember my first mistake, well I forgot to unplug it before I started walking with it. Took 2 steps, the plug caught, jerked the greenhouse and knocked over all the pellets. Luckily I didn't drop the whole thing so that was a positive, I guess. [/SIZE]
 
[SIZE=10.5pt]My second mistake meant they were only sitting in the tray loosely and once they fell over they were a bit mixed up. I re-organised them but I'm not sure that I have them back in the correct order :([/SIZE]
 
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[SIZE=10.5pt]So now I have 18 pellets with 2 seeds in each, hopefully correctly marked. sigh.[/SIZE]
 
 
 
I placed the greenhouse on top of the fridge, plugged it back in and turned it on. This morning when I checked it before work it had a fair bit of condensation in it. I opened one of the vents and it was quite warm. I don't have a thermometer so perhaps that should be my next purchase.
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[SIZE=10.5pt]As I go along I will post updates along with some photos.[/SIZE]
 
*Edit: Added photo

 
[SIZE=10.5pt]Adrian[/SIZE]
 
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I checked them out when i got home last night and was quite surprised at how dry they were. I used a spray bottle to water them all individually and i have placed them all closer together now. Gave them another quick spray this morning before leaving for work.
 
Nothing really to report yet. Been a week with nothing poking it's head up.
I'm going away for a week and a half with work, have to hand over care to the SO. Fingers crossed she doesn't forget about them and there are some shoots coming through by the time I'm back :-)
 
I'm back from my work trip and have some success to report. Six pellets have had seeds germinate, a couple with multiple germinations. Planning to wait until the second set of leaves grow before transplanting them. I believe that 3 of the Seasoning peppers have sprouted, 2 Bahamian Goat Peppers and 1 Giant White Habanero. Think i might have killed one of the Goat Peppers as it fell over and the stem was bent in half  :tear:
 
I replaced the open trays i had with one that has individual spots for each pellet; no more falling pellets. I have some photos on my phone, i'll post tomorrow. (oops, took a bit longer)
 
This is the new tray:
 
I've planted another batch of seeds, same as the above lot but without the seasoning peppers (as the last batch seemed to grow alright). I bought a Habanero plant from a local nursery which had one chilli so i used the seeds from that. Guessing it will be a hybrid since it probably wasn't isolated. I think the reason i had such a low germ rate was that the heat wasn't distributing well enough to all the pods.
This time i tried with a plastic zip lock bag and paper towel to germinate and then transferring to the pods. I took the tray out and placed the pods near the hottest part of the propagator and have had a much higher rate of germination. The seeds from the Hab have been the best.

 
I placed them into a plastic cup once they sprouted and they are going quite well. They are all coming along nicely and look like the plants in the above post.

I don't think they have been getting enough light as they don't seem to get past the stage in the photo in the above post. On the weekend i put them outside in the sun for the day, hopefully that will help them. During the week they are sitting next to a window with the curtain open but they aren't getting much direct light.
Any advice is appreciated.
 
I received some advice in the Australian growing thread so tonight I moved the plants underneath a lamp to encourage some growth.
 
The lights seem to be helping (only a few days but i'm gonna contribute this to the lights)
My first set of second leaves,  :dance:

 
Is it normal for a seed to germinate with 3 initial leaves? Is it some kind of mutant plant that i should rip out of the ground or is it a common occurance?
 
Good news Tatts. I reckon your freak will be fine.
Speaking of freaks, one of my Scotch Bonnets has given me twins. 2 stems growing from one seed. I'll only ditch it if the rest of them come up. Have 2/6 so far.
 
Hey Mate good luck with your grow.
Just remember to keep the lights down low and it's pretty normal to have 3 leaves.
 
Happy Chilli Growing,
Micca
 
SeeYouJimmy said:
Good news Tatts. I reckon your freak will be fine.
Speaking of freaks, one of my Scotch Bonnets has given me twins. 2 stems growing from one seed. I'll only ditch it if the rest of them come up. Have 2/6 so far.
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Thanks for the show of support. I'll let it live then. It actually has it's second leaves coming through.
 
Micca302 said:
Hey Mate good luck with your grow.
Just remember to keep the lights down low and it's pretty normal to have 3 leaves.
 
Happy Chilli Growing,
Micca
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Lights are on and pretty close to the propogator. I have rotated the plants as the ones closest to the light have been growing the most, unsurprisingly.
 
Will post updated photos soon, quite a few have second leaves coming through :)
 
Here is a photo of all of the plants, most of them are coming along nicely now that they have the light. Only a couple that haven't started to develop their first true leaves.
 
 
The seedlings look very nice, but u'd have to watch out that the roots dont intertwine or u will destroy them pulling them a part for transplanting.
 
Well Done Tatts
All is going good mate.
just be very careful seperating the ones in the cup. Water well before you take them apart, very gently.
 I have had all my seeds arrive.. I'm a busy boy atm.
 
DevilsEyes said:
The seedlings look very nice, but u'd have to watch out that the roots dont intertwine or u will destroy them pulling them a part for transplanting.
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Thanks, they have grown quite a bit since the last photo so i went home last night and transplanted them all into their own cups. 12 hours later when i left for work and they are all looking strong and healthy, none have drooped over or have wilted leaves.
 
PetersChilli said:
Well Done Tatts
All is going good mate.
just be very careful seperating the ones in the cup. Water well before you take them apart, very gently.
 I have had all my seeds arrive.. I'm a busy boy atm.
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I gave them a good water the night before and watered them in well. Thanks for the advice.
It's super exciting when you plant them all, such anticipation and no disappointment at that stage. lol
 
Here they are before transplanting them, proper leaves are much further advanced and they are almost double the size from the last photo:

I've given up on the remaining seeds in the zip lock bag. They haven't germinated in about 6 weeks so figure they aren't going to. I'll have to plant out some more soon. I left the ones that are in the peat pots because i ran out of cups. haha. Most of these are Habanero's, or some variant since it the plant that the chilli came on was from a nursery. There is 1 seasoning pepper (already in a cup) and 1 White Habanero (Peat Pot in the middle).The one in the punnet i forgot to label so can't remember what that is. The White Hab had roots coming through the bottom and I did have enough cups to plant it. It's the bottom right cup in the last photo.
 
This is half way through their move. I didn't leave the roots exposed like that for long, it was only for the time that i took the photo and then i covered them up again. Was quite surprised at how big the roots are for such small seedlings.

 

 
Here they are in their new homes, back on the heat mat and next to the lamp. Happy again:
 
Tatts said:
 
I've given up on the remaining seeds in the zip lock bag. They haven't germinated in about 6 weeks so figure they aren't going to. I'll have to plant out some more soon. 
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Hi Tatts!
I'm nearby, over in Lara (near Geelong!)
 
Hey, it was my first year of growing anything from seed last year, and i still have pods in the freezer from what i (as a total noob) could muster :)
I was going to say...regarding giving up on seeds....some of mine took just over 90 days to germinate, so never say never!!!
Best of luck with your grow :)
 
 
I'm nearby, over in Lara (near Geelong!)
 
I was going to say...regarding giving up on seeds....some of mine took just over 90 days to germinate, so never say never!!!
Best of luck with your grow :)

Lol, mine are still sorting outside, might bring them in and keep an eye on them. I have another batch left to try again once I have some more room on my heat pad.
If you want to buy some seeds, JungleRain is in Geelong, easy to get to for you and great prices :-)
Good luck with yours too. Have you started anything for this year?
 
Looking great Adrian! I'm in Melbourne also and my plants are a little behind yours. I grabbed the same heated propagator from Bunnings too. Good luck with your grow!
 
It's good to see that you are getting a result!  I tried to use peat pellets before in my grow and have had nothing but frustration; either too wet or too dry to ever get anything to germinate and survive.
 
Do you have drain holes on your Solo cups?
 
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