A Pepperhead glog: Pickling, Saucing, and Powdering

Okay Chiliheads,
At the end of the month I will begin my crop for this season, as it seems the hard core chilis take a while to germinate. Then it got me thinking...Why not run a few experiments to see what germination method works best. People seemed to have some issues with the Reapers so I figure I'll start there and do the same with some other superhots and compare the results.
I'm going to try three methods of germination: Overnight soaking in a solution, scarifying the seeds then overnighting in a damp towel, and for a control just straight into the dirt.
For the solution I'm going to experiment with a vinegar base, I'm thinking equal parts vinegar and water and a little H2O2. I'm trying vinegar off the animal digestive tract transportation and deposit theory. Let's see if the vinegar acidity breaks down the shell a little.
I'm going to use a matchbook to scarify the seeds for the damp papertowels.
I will do my best to post temps, soil conditions, water amounts, etc.
All results with some pictures and colorful graphs will be posted.

I know this forum is full of smartypants, many with much smarter pants than me, so I actively encourage ideas and constructive criticisms to make this as scientifically accurate as I can make it. Perhaps a recommendation for the vinegar solution?

What this Glog is: Hopefully fun and educational for the Glogger and the reader.

What it is not: A forum to whine about the seed suppliers. Even the slightest grumble about any of the suppliers of my seeds will get you reported. My Glog, my rules.

So give me some ideas and the last week of January I'll be ready to go! Enjoy!

 

[Dshlogg]

I'm sure the new setup will work great! Unfortunately I can't see the pics of it though. I had problems seeing Photobucket pics which I fixed but I can't see yours. What site do you use?

Thanks for the shout out. I'm glad your germ tank is cranking out seedlings. I don't know if I get higher germ rates with mine but I get way faster germination and more even heat than a heat mat. They're cheaper and easier to find than a heat mat too.

I'll get on my laptop when I have a chance to check out your pics.

 

[Pepperhead]

I use photobucket and haven't had any problems. I suspect stable temps and stable humidity are the real key to that set up. It's kind of fire and forget. I need to figure out a similar system with dirt. Now my brain's working and I'm getting ideas...

 

[Pepperhead]

So I'm calling it for bubblegum 7 pot, unless a wave of new votes comes in before tomorrow night, although I'm also going to try the black naga as well. Something just spoke to me about it. Both have been in the incubator for a coupla days now anyway. Took five days for seeds to arrive from Hippy Seeds in Australia last time, we'll see how long it takes this time. I'm expecting next Monday.

 

[Pepperhead]

Gah! Reorganized my Photobucket and now a lot of the pictures are gone. Gonna have to go back and edit.

 

[Sawyer]

Can someone please post a link to Dshlogg's incubator setup? I tried searching, but came up empty. Thanks.

Nevermind, I found it. That seems like a near-perfect way to keep a constant temperature for germination.

 

[Pepperhead]

Butch t replacements arrived from Australia yesterday. Put 3 in the incubator. Let's hope for better luck this time.

 

[Pepperhead]

No movement yet on the 7 pot bubblegum yet but the black naga has 2 sprouts that went into dirt last night. I had to reorganize my grow cabinet because I was out of room. So I cut up my jiffy grow thingy since a significant amount was just empty pods from transfers or non sprouted seeds. I now have much more room for more sprouts. My tomatoes are really rocking, except the blacks. Not one of those came up.

 

[Pepperhead]

Picture day! Got a new camera and thought I'd test it out:

Ghost

Reaper

Carribean Red habs

My 7 Pots are like cats. They just seem like whenever you try to help them, they are all too willing to scratch your eyes out. This one and a couple of others have been a struggle, but they are getting by:

Grow shelf top row peppers and tomatoes. Couple of mysteries in there, stuff just got away from me:

Bottom row

And finally some young Primos:

 

[Pepperhead]

So I swore that I had more Jonahs than one, but thought it was all in my head until today. I was looking through the cabinet and moved a Solo cup and low and behold, a prematurely dehydrated Jonah, leaving me with one for the season. But I did receive some seeds from coheed today, so I popped a Brain Strain into dirt. Let's hope for the best on that one.

 

[PjPEPPERS]

Hope the 7 pot bubblegum pull through for you soon. Be good to see them grow. Everything else looks like it's doing good for you though.

The pots your using look interesting, are they a biodegradable type?

Good luck for the rest of the sown seeds

 

[Pepperhead]

Hope the 7 pot bubblegum pull through for you soon. Be good to see them grow. Everything else looks like it's doing good for you though.

The pots your using look interesting, are they a biodegradable type?

Good luck for the rest of the sown seeds

Thanks!
The Bubblegums are sprouting, have cotys on one. The round pots are jiffys, the small square ones are Walmart purchased seed trays, and the big square ones are a neat find. They're Cow Pots made from composted cow manure. For you new guys, one lesson I learned for next year: all square pots. I think it'll make for better use of space.

We had an excellent day here today, plenty of sun, light wind, perfect for some hardening off. So out came the tomatoes and peppers for their first look at daylight.

Not only that but I have 1 more Primo popping a rootlet in the incubator and finally, a Butch T!

 

[Pepperhead]

The Butch T was 8 days in the incubator before I saw the first rootlet. That puts it just about right with everything else I've grown. A few late starts including the last of my Primos and I expect the other 2 Butches as well as some Brain Strains that skipped the incubator and went straight to dirt.

 

[Pepperhead]

I was reediting a couple of old posts because I rearranged my photobucket account. Now the pictures can be viewed again and I couldn't believe how in such a short amount of time everything grew:

Reaper

 

[Sanarda]

Now that you have tried most germ techniques. Which one would you use in the future?

 

[Pepperhead]

Now that you have tried most germ techniques. Which one would you use in the future?

I would definately go with the modified papertowel method found Here. Easy to control heat and humidity, and I bet if you could add dirt into the mix it would save a little effort transferring it later. But it was relatively cheap and the results were dramatic. I will compare the two again next year, because I switched horses mid race from paper towels and bags to the new method. For speed of germination and environmental control, it's definately a winner.

 

[Sanarda]

When you see no movement, can you move the seeds to another germ medium?

 

[Pepperhead]

I will tell you that in dirt everything got left alone, if it didn't come up it didn't come up. I switched from the paper towels to the little cups no problem. From the cups the only problem I had was trying to move them to dirt with my fat fingers. Use tweezers. In the cups, near as I could tell, if the seed was good, it popped. Had Primos that had been in there an extra coupla weeks pop just recently.
I couldn't tell you how effective moving them would be. In the tank the Primos took the longest, some popping after a month, while others popped much sooner. My new batch of butch T's had the first one pop in 8 days. Orange habs were about 4 or 5 days. I'm going to go out on a limb and guess variety and seed source (Genetics) have some effect on germ times, but not as much as heat, and humidity. My numbers got all out of whack when I had my overwater apocalypse, but I'll try so see what I've got for germ time and variety data.

Just noticed you're from Jersey. I was born in Passaic. Just had to throw that out there.

 

[Sanarda]

Thank you for that. I don't know what to do with my re attempts as they are slower to germ than my first attempts. So, thanks for your input. I'm in Plainfield,NJ. Little far from Passaic. I'm much closer to Newark. About 15-20 mins.

 

[Pepperhead]

I would guess there would be no issue moving them from paper towel to cups. I bet the heater would be the most exorbitant expense at around 15 bucks. Everything else you could pick up at Walmart for another 10 bucks. And you probably (depending on your growout) wouldn't need to restock for two seasons.

 

[armac]

if you get a stubborn seed, clip the tip of it with nail clippers, it is having problems breaking it own shell. then replace it in the soil or whatever germing method you are employing.