Canedog Offseason Season 2022/23

Well, shoot. I don't know that I should start a new glog with as poor as I was about updating my last one, but here it goes. My offseason season started late, with most of my plants being probably four to six weeks old now. I'll start by posting a few of the newer ones.

This guy is an Oxkutzcab/Oxkutzcabian Orange Habanero. I have three of these growing and a couple Caribbean Red Habanero that are smaller. The Oxkutzcab seem to be out-pacing the reds, but they've also been around a little longer. In this pic I particularly like the transition in the stem at the cotyledons.

@HeatMiser sent me some of his wild texas tepin seeds - what, a couple years ago now? - and I've been trying to grow the variety to production ever since. The seeds were collected off a wild-growing bush in 2014 and still sprout just fine. I have three of the plants growing that I've overwintered, but it's been a very long-season variety for me here in the pnw and between that and the impact of an aphid infestation last winter I haven't yet gotten any of them to ripe pods. I started this new one with the idea of getting it well-established inside and hopefully it will be mature enough to produce by next season. I may just keep it inside until it does.

Aji Guyana. I've grow this variety for a couple seasons now after Wiri Wiri shared seeds with me. I always end up topping it, so I got that out of the way early this time. I'm hoping once will be enough, but if it gets unruly it may end up seeing the scissors again. Great production out of these and pretty early for a baccatum.

This is a second generation (with me) ollantaytambo amarillo rocoto. I was hoping the parent's pods would be more pale that they were, but it produced great-looking yellow pods this summer, which I thought had great flavor. I'm curious whether this next generation's pods will be unchanged, plus it's likely getting crossed with one or two other rocotos I have growing now that are close to the same age.

Uvalde Pequin, from @CraftyFox - thanks man! It looked a little rough when it first came up, but it's looking much stronger now.

I'm working with several mexican culinary varieties, growing given varieties from multiple sources and in different variations to find out what I like best. Pasilla Oaxaca, Pasilla Negro Bahia, and Guajillo are among them. These guys are the most recent sprouts. The others have been growing a while and are more established.

Guajillo

Pasilla Oaxaca

Pasilla Negro Bahia

I'll close with this guy. I thought I'd run out of the orange arequipa rocoto seeds I'd acquired a couple years back, but I found one scraggly seed in the corner of a seed baggie and that scraggly seed has turned into this scraggly young plant. When it germinated I thought the roots might not be strong enough for it to survive, but I've tried to water it just right and it keeps getting stronger day-by-day. If it keeps improving like it has it might make a good match for the ollantaytambo amarillo rocoto.

 

[Grass Snake]

How long will you keep them in the condiment cup? Yours look bigger than the ones I have.

 

[CaneDog]

These cups are 5.5oz and the inside bottom diameter is about that of a fifty-cent piece. I like that they hold moisture pretty well and give roots some growth room prior to transplant.

As soon as one sprouts, I'll move that that cup out from the humi-dome and under the lights, then take its lid off when I'm sure the seed coat won't be an issue. I have records from when I was starting seeds this way for my current indoor grow and the average stay in the cup after sprouting was 11 days, with a low of 7 and high of 16. If I'd answered without looking, I'd have probably guessed 2 to 2-1/2 weeks. I want them to get established a bit and have good true leaf development, but I don't want them to stall because the root area lacks depth.

 

[Grass Snake]

As soon as one sprouts, I'll move that that cup out from the humi-dome and under the lights, then take its lid off when I'm sure the seed coat won't be an issue.

So is the lid on the cup when it's in the humi-dome? How can you tell with the seed coat?

 

[CaneDog]

So is the lid on the cup when it's in the humi-dome? How can you tell with the seed coat?

Yep. The first four days I leave the lids sealed and don't mess with them much. Then I pop up the lids and leave them just lying over the cup so I can more easily lift them to check for sprouts.

As soon as I see any part of the split of the cotyledons outside the seed coat I'm good, because even if it were to stick at that point the growth tip will be safely outside.

 

[Grass Snake]

I'm trying to germinate for the first time using these cups but I just have the cups sitting on the heat mat with lid closed. Think that will be good enough? It’s just old seeds I’m trying to see if something will hatch.

 

[CaneDog]

Yeah, sure. I like to sandwich them between a couple towels so the temp swings aren't as much and I think they retain moisture better that way, but I've totally done it exactly the way you are.

 

[Tinkerbelle]

Garden Betty says: "Just don’t keep them too hot (like on top of a heating pad), as you risk cooking the seeds before they ever sprout."

@Grass Snake what temperature is your heat mat for germinating?

 

[Grass Snake]

what temperature is your heat mat for germinating?

Not sure honestly, I would hope the heat mat is pre-set to germinate at optimum temps. The mat just plugs and there is no adjustable settings. The cups are sitting on the edge of the mat where it doesn't get as hot like the middle does.

 

[Sulsa]

In my experience most heatmats become just a bit too warm for the ideal germination temps of peppers.
Temps often rise to around 86F / 30C or even more wich could harm germination or enhance the risk of damping off.
Putting an extra layer on top like the towel Canedog is using could compensate for that. You could also throw in a few more bux and get yourself a nice thermostat. This way you have more control and the ability to bring down the temperatures after germination.

 

[Tinkerbelle]

@Sulsa - what's the ideal temperature for germination?
I've got a thermostat on the heat mat so could use it for germinating seeds

 

[Sulsa]

Between 24C and 29C is fine. I always set the thermostat to 27C and once they are up i gradually start bringing the temps down a bit.

 

[CaneDog]

Lots of the solo cup peppers are ripening now, which is good as I'll need to prune some back and clear out others to make way for the new sprouts sprouting.

So far, from the early bunch, I have rocotos de seda, oro, giant red arequipa, and largo; datil; papa dreadie; faria scotch bonnet; yaki blue fawn; habanero tabaquite; and madre de rios.

New bunch

Giant Red Arequipa. These are my go-to big red rocoto. Big strong fast-growing plants with big pods and good heat. Love the stems that are already like little tree trunks.

Yaki Blue Fawn. I'm super happy to see these pop. I must have given away more seeds than I thought, because when I looked I had only 2 seeds remaining. I'd have hated to lose these as they've been really awesome.

I had some old peachadew/peppa peach seeds from several years back and finally got around to planting some. They have some interesting stripey-like coloration on them. I plan to prune this plant after harvesting the pods/seeds and then move it outside for better production this summer.

This was supposed to be an antep aci dolma. The seeds were open pollinated from a very nice phenotype I grew and my best guess is this one got crossed with a mulato isleno, though with the chlorophyll retainer gene cl being recessive it raises questions... Fortunately I have remaining original seeds and true seeds for the AAD - as well as another plant growing - but it will be cool to see what becomes of this.

The mari wiri is flowering profusely and hopefully setting pods somewhere in there as well.

The tekne dolmasi twins suffered initially under unfavorable environmental conditions, but persevered. Happy to have fresh isolated seeds for the annuum starts in another week or two.

Happy to have confirmed iso seeds for this golden cayenne too, though I may just prune and restart this one rather than plant new seeds as it seems to be a reasonably strong plant.

Pasilla Oaxaca. I've been working with pasilla seeds of multiple varieties and from multiple sources to figure out which I like best and get a dependable seed stock for those. These oaxaca have looked promising so far. The other pasilla I'm working with are bahia negro, mixe, and apaseo. I grew a fantastic bahia negro a few years back, but the seed source was hybridized and only that one plant has grown true so far despite that I've grown out almost that full bag of seeds Wish I'd save seeds from the one that grew true, but I didn't expect problems with the remainder of the bag

Unknown. This guy is from seeds that were supposed to be chile de arbol. I bought the seeds from what's typically been a good source for me, but I've grown at least a half-dozen plants from them now plus several second generation plants and they all produced the same clustered upright peppers. The seed seller advertises a thai dragon that looks exactly like this, so I think the most likely explanation is that the seeds were mispackaged.

Er jing tiao. The seeds for these came from commercially dried pods. I ended up keeping only two plants from the seeds that germinated (roughly 9 out of about 300 seeds, IIRC) and it looks like that's going to get me some confirmed, isolated seeds with which to go forward. It was fun to see if I could make these guys happen from the dried pods, though now I'm looking forward to seeing how productive they can be outside with better legroom.

 

[CaneDog]

I'll add this post about a method I use sometimes for certain helmet heads.

These c reapers just popped up today; both with helmet heads. When I catch them with the hook still above head level, I like to use this technique.

My first step is to cover them with dry peat moss starter mix - this is MG seed starting potting mix. I try to cover them completely in a mound that goes only slightly above the hooks, but well out toward the sides.

Ready for step 2, spraying. I try to spray very gently at first to avoid moving too much of the peat off the hooks and to the side.

Sprayed down carefully, the hooks are only just poking through with the seeds completely buried. Despite it looking quite wet, the spraying was fairly superficial. I don't aim to saturate the peat; just to get it damp enough to bind.

And the last step is to put on the top back on and move them under lights, giving them better humidity as the cotyledons continue to try to work themselves free. My thinking is that the seed coats will be held down below the surface due to the binding of the peat moss around them, while the hypocotyl continues to grow upward into the light. In theory, this keeps the seed coat in a moist environment while the sprout grows its way out and into the light. Now, let's see if it works this time!

When I first started playing around with this method I found that (i) if I buried the sprouts completely, they didn't always come up again and, when they did, didn't always do as well at shaking the helmet; and (ii) once the "hook" has grown out such that the helmet heads aren't pointing down from the arc, they don't do well with this method. If I catch them at the right time, my success rate has been pretty good, even times when the testa is clamped down at the collar.

 

[HeatMiser]

Looking good CD! It's great to see that you can grow plants to full maturity in solo cups in order to get isolated seed. Those upright clustered pods sure do look like Thai Dragon - nothing wrong with those! They are good producers...

 

[Ratatouille]

That helmet tip is something I need to try out. I think I might have offed a seedling this morning, 'helping' it out of its helmet by pinching.

 

[CaneDog]

That helmet tip is something I need to try out. I think I might have offed a seedling this morning, 'helping' it out if its helmet by pinching.

I think we've all helped out a little too much at one time or another

 

[Tinkerbelle]

I've got a couple of helmet heads - I'm going to try this CD, it better work.

ETA - just by reading your post one helmet head has escaped already

 

[ChilliCrosser]

Who'd have thought you'd get away with those blue cups all those months ago? Just goes to show there is only a weak correlation between solo cup colour and plant health

Great growing as always!

 

[MarcV]

I'm always surprised to see fruiting pepper plants in a coffe cup!

 

[CaneDog]

The helmet head reapers from post 73 are looking better this morning