What really are they?

CAPCOM · Oct 15, 2016

The pic below was grown as a red borg9 short.

I see so many variations that it is difficult to be assured that your labors have produced what you really intended, and garner from them true knowledge of a particular variety of pepper.

I am hoping this thread will aid all the non expert chili botanists to what is out there, how it came about and what to possibly expect.

For instance, madd balls are supposed to be a cross between the chocolate bhut and a yellow 7 pot. They produce a chocolate devils tongue shaped and size pod and what I have grown in the past a chocolate bhut long size and shaped pod. I have also grown caramel maddballs and reds of the same variety, color seeming to be the only visual difference.

So what of the seemingly different Borgs and Lavas. The Lavas I have grown look nothing like Judys Lavas. Or, am I really growing Lavas at all? What was used to create Borgs and Lavas?

I will say, what I have grown as Lavas tastes nothing like anything I have tried before and has an uncommon heat profile.

thegreenman · Oct 15, 2016

Instability is always an issue, moreso with these newer crosses. The original breeder or line developer determines what is true through continued selection and breeding. The strain is never finished, it must be continuously maintained. As far as I am concerned the ONLY way to get a true strain of anything is to go directly to the source. If I want a true Primo, the only person I'll go to is Troy. If I want a true Datil, I'll go to the Minorcans.

CAPCOM · Oct 15, 2016

thegreenman said:
Instability is always an issue, moreso with these newer crosses. The original breeder or line developer determines what is true through continued selection and breeding. The strain is never finished, it must be continuously maintained. As far as I am concerned the ONLY way to get a true strain of anything is to go directly to the source. If I want a true Primo, the only person I'll go to is Troy.

Agreed.
But the grower community full of these possible variants or frauds still poses the OP questions. Further, I would suspect new crosses to be stable on release, making them, not new crosses. But new variety.

BlackFatalii · Oct 15, 2016

CAPCOM said:
What was used to create Borgs and Lavas?

My understanding is that the red Borg 9 is a Naglah x BBG7. Buckeye says in their description that the Borg 9 seeds they are selling are only F3. So, the Borg 9 would seem to be an F3 cross of two crossed peppers that may not be stable yet themselves. I would expect something like that to be about as stable as a wet fart. :rolleyes:

CAPCOM · Oct 15, 2016

BlackFatalii said:
My understanding is that the red Borg 9 is a Naglah x BBG7. Buckeye says in their description that the Borg 9 seeds they are selling are only F3. So, the Borg 9 would seem to be an F3 cross of two crossed peppers that may not be stable yet themselves. I would expect something like that to be about as stable as a wet fart.

And I would intend to agree 100% with you. It is supposed to take 8 generations to obtain stability.

Or are we to the point that a new gnarly super hot pepper is acquired and the urge to make a quick buck is immediately sought after.

Could also be that Buckeye did a cross themselves and there naglah x bbg7 cross is only F3. and not the original product.

I could also be that the Borgs I am growing are in fact borgs and just expressing differently. Which is the whole point of this thread.

megahot · Oct 15, 2016

thegreenman said:
Instability is always an issue, moreso with these newer crosses. The original breeder or line developer determines what is true through continued selection and breeding. The strain is never finished, it must be continuously maintained. As far as I am concerned the ONLY way to get a true strain of anything is to go directly to the source. If I want a true Primo, the only person I'll go to is Troy. If I want a true Datil, I'll go to the Minorcans.

Agreed unlesd the strain is isolated. I didnt Isolate any of my plants this yr and I regret it. Next Yr Im going to be isolating some plants. Not all of them but the ones I really care about regrowing in the near future. Another thing we all need to keep in mind is that plants wont always put out the correct pheno type. I noticed this with my BTR. Two plants put out correct pheno types and the other two didnt.

BlackFatalii · Oct 16, 2016

CAPCOM said:
Or are we to the point that a new gnarly super hot pepper is acquired and the urge to make a quick buck is immediately sought after.

Sadly, I think this is happening more and more often. The Chocolate Bhutlah is a good example. Steven McLauren only very recently released it. It is a Bhut x Douglah x Butch T. But some vendors were selling "Chocolate Bhutlahs" long before he released it. Those all seem to be Bhut x Douglah crosses. Not the same genetics, but they will still sell them under the same name because of all the hype associated with that name. And people will just see the name "Chocolate Bhutlah" and buy it in good faith, and assume that they now have the the pepper that started all the hype, when in fact they don't.

CAPCOM said:
Could also be that Buckeye did a cross themselves and there naglah x bbg7 cross is only F3. and not the original product.

It could be. Although it seems very wrong to me to do your own cross and still represent it as Jon Harper's Borg 9. Even if your cross was done using the same two parent varieties, to me it is still a separate lineage. I prefer to think the good people at Buckeye wouldn't do such a thing. Also the Hippy Seed Company describes the Borg 9 seeds they are selling as F3 also, so I'm really starting to think that is where it is supposed to be at. That's pretty early to be selling it IMO, but at least both companies point out that it is an unstable F3 cross, so nothing is misrepresented, and their customers know exactly what they are buying.

CAPCOM · Oct 16, 2016

BlackFatalii said:
Sadly, I think this is happening more and more often. The Chocolate Bhutlah is a good example. Steven McLauren only very recently released it. It is a Bhut x Douglah x Butch T. But some vendors were selling "Chocolate Bhutlahs" long before he released it. Those all seem to be Bhut x Douglah crosses. Not the same genetics, but they will still sell them under the same name because of all the hype associated with that name. And people will just see the name "Chocolate Bhutlah" and buy it in good faith, and assume that they now have the the pepper that started all the hype, when in fact they don't.

It could be. Although it seems very wrong to me to do your own cross and still represent it as Jon Harper's Borg 9. Even if your cross was done using the same two parent varieties, to me it is still a separate lineage. I prefer to think the good people at Buckeye wouldn't do such a thing. Also the Hippy Seed Company describes the Borg 9 seeds they are selling as F3 also, so I'm really starting to think that is where it is supposed to be at. That's pretty early to be selling it IMO, but at least both companies point out that it is an unstable F3 cross, so nothing is misrepresented, and their customers know exactly what they are buying.

Good points.
I dont see anything wrong with making identical crosses and calling the result Borg9 though. So long as you dont call it Jon Harper Borg9.