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2022 - too early to get started...

My real start of the season is still months away but I couldn't resist to put something in the soil already - Tasmanian Black! :dance:

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I'm happy to say that the papa dreadies are doing just fine 🙂. The smaller one had a helmet head that I removed but it's doing fine also.
The tent is still over the pot but I cut the top off so the moisture can escape. I think I'll remove the tent after the weekend.

Of the second batch of papa dreadies only one out of 4 has germinated so far.

My original seedlings have all been eliminated with the exception of the 2 that looked the best but even then they don't want to restart growing, even though they are now in the same pot/medium/tent as the papa dreadies. Thinking of eliminating those also. I'm regrowing these and a couple of other varieties anyway.

Besides of the bonnets I now also have some 7pot nebru and JPGS germinating, and I'm thinking of adding Carbonero to the list also.

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After the disaster growth of the first round of seedlings I decided to start from the beginning an I'm happy that the new seedlings appear to grow properly.

Currently I have multiple seedlings of papa dreadie, a couple of seedlings of the marabella market caramel and one of the HSH seeds is also showing some life. The only other sb seeds currently in the soil are white sb and beth boyd. The beth boyd seeds are already a couple of years old so they probably may take a while to pop (and as you know I'm a little impatient 😊). Other non sb seeds in rhe soil now are jpgs, carbonero and 7pot nebru. The jpgs is in the soil for a while now but isn't showing any sign of life yet...
 
Back on track... not so much... 🙄

Only those papa dreadies of the above picture have grown since. After opening and later removing those tents it looks like the small seedlings were stunted again. The difference with the dreadies is probably that I let those under the closed tent until some true leaves appeared. So back under a closed tent the others went. I hope it sparks their growth again. I'm now beginning to suspect that the air humidity may be too low... 🤔

Had to start some of the varieties for the third time... the second round of the white scotch bonnets were all helmet heads. Maybe also caused by dry air? So out they went and new seeds have been planted. The HSH scotch bonnets are still green and alive but are really tiny and a bit irregular shaped so I planted a couple of extra seeds of those. Let's hope those will grow well. With everything under their tents again it's difficult to make another bunch of pictures but :pics:...

The tepee village...
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The young papa dreadies...
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The tasmanian black has it's first flower open. The plant doesn't look very nice otherwise. I'm wondering if I should top it?
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Close-up of the flower...
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Having to deal with the failures also brings me to planting other (non scotch bonnet) varieties. These are what I'm growing (or better - trying to grow) or have sown right now:

  • SB Papa Dreadie G3 2021
  • SB HSH
  • SB "Caramella Market"
  • SB White
  • SB Beth Boyd
  • 7-pot Nebru
  • Carbonero
  • Hot Paper Lantern Habanero
Apologies to the donors of the seeds that didn't make it in the grow list... 😯

None of the JPGS seeds that I had sown previously did germinate so those have been removed from the grow list.
I did not plan to grow any annuums this year (except for the Tasmanian black of course) but last Friday my wife came home with some huge and incredibly delicious Ramiro sweet peppers and she spontaneously came over to me asking to plant some of the seeds. And since she doesn't like the taste of the chinenses I decided to plant a couple of Piment D'Espelette seeds also. And on top of that I added some Doux Long Des Landes sweet peppers also, which is a species that is grown in SW France just like the Piment D'Espelette.
 
Small update... Tasmanian Black flower opened up completely but not producing any pollen yet...
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I have also planted out the two largest Papa Dreadies in their own pots and put them next to the Tasmanian Black...
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@MarcV - You are making progress, my friend.
Sorry to hear you have had to restart so many
times, but perseverance wins the day!

That Tasmanian Black will pack on the pods
once it gets going. Mine took quite a while to
ripen, but production was good. A very attrac-
tive plant as well.
 
The tasmanian black is a bit leggy right now, that's why I'm wondering is I should top it. But normally I prefer to let them go their own way.

I'm still confused about the failures... when I compare this year's grow with pictures from previous years... last year I had all seedlings with true leaves ready to transplant by the end of February, including chinenses...
 
The tasmanian black is a bit leggy right now, that's why I'm wondering is I should top it. But normally I prefer to let them go their own way.

I'm still confused about the failures... when I compare this year's grow with pictures from previous years... last year I had all seedlings with true leaves ready to transplant by the end of February, including chinenses...
They do tend to grow leggy; once outside they will branche up nicely. Don't know how far you are from plantout but I told you this variety was a fast growing one ;) among my fastest growers in fact with the GRIF9148 and a few C. baccatum
 
They do tend to grow leggy; once outside they will branche up nicely. Don't know how far you are from plantout but I told you this variety was a fast growing one ;) among my fastest growers in fact with the GRIF9148 and a few C. baccatum

Still way too early to put them outside but it may need a larger pot sooner or later...

Hang in there, @MarcV. You are doing all the right things.

Yes, hang in there... success is coming!

I'm not seeing any response from the plants to any of my actions. They just sit there doing nothing... They pop, spread their cotys and that's it, no more growth after that...
I'm losing my faith in chili growing... 😥 Still wonder why the first batch of papa dreadies did grow properly...
 
I have several varieties which are stalled out at the same phase, with true leaves just visible but further development seemingly halted. It’s very discouraging!

My experience with non-pepper gardening suggests that as long as they look healthy, they’re probably still up to something. I would treat them just as usual, no extreme measures. Time will tell.
 
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+1 @thoroughburro - My BOC Din Bjarnes is a
good case in point. Seedling exceedingly tiny, with
very slow growth, but in the last week has started
to expand at a more rapid pace. Looks like it will
be a decent plant. I think sometimes they just have
their own agenda. Patience usually yields results!

Will post up a recent pic for you @MarcV.
 
For now they still look healthy, so there's still hope.
I moved them to the veranda. We have sunny weather these days so it gets quite warm and bright in there and during night time temperature is kept at around 17°C/62.6°F. The 2 papa dreadies have been in there for a while now and they are doing fine.
 
Ramiro and Piment D'Espelette are germinating as we speak. No sign of life from the Piment Doux Des Landes for now though...
I'm also still awaiting the germination of the white scotch bonnet but I'm starting to fear that it might be a fail...

Today also I planted some seeds again of some varieties that failed in the previous round - stuffing Scotch Bonnet from Trident and JA Red hab from PaulG. Let's hope they do well this time. Circumstances in the veranda are better now, nights are less cold and during the day there's the bright sunlight and temperature rises considerably also. I'm cautiously optimistic that these circumstances have a positive effect on the seedlings that were already put in there. I seem to notice a little bit of growth! 🙂
 
...and again, my seedlings aren't growing at all but instead are starting to turn yellow 😥...

I'm not going to try to regrow anything for now. I still have my overwinterers and they are starting to show some serious growth. The young papa dreadies are still ok although they haven't grown much yet. I'm hoping that at least those two will keep doing fine.

I still have a couple of stuffing scotch bonnets that just popped in the propagator. I'm going to leave them in there with the vents opened and see how they evolve.

Maybe I'll try germinating a couple more seeds later in the season when it's warm enough to put them outside immediately. It'll probably be too late for harvesting if they do take off but I can overwinter them and have a harvest next season...
 
Sorry to hear that news, Marc. I hope you
can get a handle on the growth issues you
are having. Did the JA Habs germinate yet?
 
I’ve had a very similar issue with my seedlings. The culprit wound up being too much light, in my case. Incidentally, my Scotch Bonnets (albeit TFM) also thrived under the light others yellowed and stalled under. Something to consider.

I should have caught it sooner, but didn’t think my lights were powerful enough. Easy to underestimate LEDs, I guess!
 
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