Hey Everyone!
Over the past few weeks, I have planted samples of chiltepin seeds from the different plants around Tucson (and one set from Nogales, Sonora) I collected. One of the best results so far happen to be from a collection that I had serious reservations about.
Back in April or May, I learned from a produce manager at a local Hispanic grocer that there was/is a severe chiltepin shortage this year. At the time, I was making my chiltepin salsa at least once a week for a certain Congressman's campaign that I was working for. Realizing that I might run out of chiltepins before the end of the election, and not having any for myself afterwards, I went into a panic-buy mode. All of the grocers were out of chiltepins. But then I remembered the retail store of Native Seed Search, which is here in Tucson, as they have a few food products.
Sure enough, Native Seed Search had jars of chiltepins for sale! I thought they were expensive at the time, being $7 for a 1 ounce jar. Now, when you happen to find chiltepins for sale in the area (which is rare), they go for about $12 an ounce...Except at Native Seed Search! I was there a week ago, and they still have a supply of their jarred chiltepins at $7 each. I guess they didn't get the memo.
So I purchased three of the jars of chiltepins. The volunteer at the counter (they're a non-profit) told me that it might be possible to grow some chiltepins from those in the jar, but she wasn't sure. Meanwhile, just a month before I had purchased a pack of Native Seed Search's chiltepin seeds for $4.95, which contained 26 seeds.
When I decided to test each of the batches of seeds I had collected, I decided to test seeds from the jarred chiltepins as well, even though I had my doubts. Well, it appears that those seeds did quite well. The middle six, with the three nice starts, are from the seed jar.
Each 1 ounce jar contains between 250 and 300 chiltepins. I recently seeded the 266 chiltepins I picked at a local park and had about 4,500 seeds, so I'm guessing that there are a few thousand chiltepin seeds in each jar. Meanwhile, the chiltepin packet basically costs about 20 cents per seed. Quite a difference.
I've read that all chiltepins are sun dried, but I wasn't so sure that was actually the case. I personally used my dehydrator to quickly dry the ones I picked off my own plants this year (they were next to some piquin plants, so they were probably crossed anyway).
As a side note, the row just in front of the sprouts from the jarred chiltepins are from seeds I collected from this very unkept chiltepin plant in someone's front yard down in the South part of Tucson. A few branches were poking out of the fence, so I picked a few. After all, it looked like no one had tended that plant for a long time. I didn't put much faith into those seeds. But they are also doing quite well!
In the past, I've bought some other varieties of dried peppers at different grocery stores, and I've been able to sprout seeds from some of the varieties, while others wouldn't sprout.
Over the past few weeks, I have planted samples of chiltepin seeds from the different plants around Tucson (and one set from Nogales, Sonora) I collected. One of the best results so far happen to be from a collection that I had serious reservations about.
Back in April or May, I learned from a produce manager at a local Hispanic grocer that there was/is a severe chiltepin shortage this year. At the time, I was making my chiltepin salsa at least once a week for a certain Congressman's campaign that I was working for. Realizing that I might run out of chiltepins before the end of the election, and not having any for myself afterwards, I went into a panic-buy mode. All of the grocers were out of chiltepins. But then I remembered the retail store of Native Seed Search, which is here in Tucson, as they have a few food products.
Sure enough, Native Seed Search had jars of chiltepins for sale! I thought they were expensive at the time, being $7 for a 1 ounce jar. Now, when you happen to find chiltepins for sale in the area (which is rare), they go for about $12 an ounce...Except at Native Seed Search! I was there a week ago, and they still have a supply of their jarred chiltepins at $7 each. I guess they didn't get the memo.
So I purchased three of the jars of chiltepins. The volunteer at the counter (they're a non-profit) told me that it might be possible to grow some chiltepins from those in the jar, but she wasn't sure. Meanwhile, just a month before I had purchased a pack of Native Seed Search's chiltepin seeds for $4.95, which contained 26 seeds.
When I decided to test each of the batches of seeds I had collected, I decided to test seeds from the jarred chiltepins as well, even though I had my doubts. Well, it appears that those seeds did quite well. The middle six, with the three nice starts, are from the seed jar.
Each 1 ounce jar contains between 250 and 300 chiltepins. I recently seeded the 266 chiltepins I picked at a local park and had about 4,500 seeds, so I'm guessing that there are a few thousand chiltepin seeds in each jar. Meanwhile, the chiltepin packet basically costs about 20 cents per seed. Quite a difference.
I've read that all chiltepins are sun dried, but I wasn't so sure that was actually the case. I personally used my dehydrator to quickly dry the ones I picked off my own plants this year (they were next to some piquin plants, so they were probably crossed anyway).
As a side note, the row just in front of the sprouts from the jarred chiltepins are from seeds I collected from this very unkept chiltepin plant in someone's front yard down in the South part of Tucson. A few branches were poking out of the fence, so I picked a few. After all, it looked like no one had tended that plant for a long time. I didn't put much faith into those seeds. But they are also doing quite well!
In the past, I've bought some other varieties of dried peppers at different grocery stores, and I've been able to sprout seeds from some of the varieties, while others wouldn't sprout.
