Dragon Cayenne

A few pods appear to be ripe.  They're a nice pretty red and about 1.5 inches long. I'll try one soon and report.  The plant is still fairly compact; hopefully the fruit size will increase before long.
 
Anyone else have ripe peppers?
 
It seems that the more flowers I snip, the more it produces.  I think I'll leave a fair number and see what happens.  With a long growing season, I'm not too worried about absolute fruit production.
 
I've got pods, maybe 2 dozen of them, none of them are ripe yet.
 
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I pulled my first ripe pod from one of my Dragon Cayenne plants today, I'm going to use it for seeds since it's one of the only pods on there that isn't likely back-crossed with the nearby Thai plants.  It was about a half inch shorter than most of the other pods on the plants but had ten medium sized seeds in it.  Heat was noticeable (which is saying something in my case) and flavor was more Thai than cayenne.  Very thick walls and rather juicy.  I'm kind of impressed---they are heavy producers too which is something it takes after from the Thai parent I suppose.
 
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as you can see they have a nice, dark almost blood/crimson color to them
 
Yea, they're hot little buggers!
 
The first to ripen a few weeks back was underwhelming, so I left the next a week after it turned red.  The flavor wasn't very noticeable, but I was eating other things at the time, so my 'test' is inherently borked.   The heat, OTOH, was fairly impressive, considering I only nibbled a third of one small pod to start.  It certainly takes after the Thai side of the family, and is hotter than any cayenne I've yet encountered - I'd guess 100K SHU or so.  (Being a relative noob to hot peppers, this is not much more than a WAG.)
 
The plant still hasn't grown as much as I might have hoped, but it is exploding with flowers and small fruit.  I'm just gonna let it go and take what it gives me.  As all my plants get bigger and bushier, they provide more shade to the containers they're growing in, allowing more direct sun w/o overheating the soil.  Hopefully the Dragon will like more full sun and increase it's growth rate! 
 
Geonerd said:
Yea, they're hot little buggers!
 
The first to ripen a few weeks back was underwhelming, so I left the next a week after it turned red.  The flavor wasn't very noticeable, but I was eating other things at the time, so my 'test' is inherently borked.   The heat, OTOH, was fairly impressive, considering I only nibbled a third of one small pod to start.  It certainly takes after the Thai side of the family, and is hotter than any cayenne I've yet encountered - I'd guess 100K SHU or so.  (Being a relative noob to hot peppers, this is not much more than a WAG.)
 
The plant still hasn't grown as much as I might have hoped, but it is exploding with flowers and small fruit.  I'm just gonna let it go and take what it gives me.  As all my plants get bigger and bushier, they provide more shade to the containers they're growing in, allowing more direct sun w/o overheating the soil.  Hopefully the Dragon will like more full sun and increase it's growth rate! 
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Yeah I can barely tell that orange habs burn anymore after all the fresh scorpions, purees, and gusher challenges etc. I've been doing recently...so any annuum that gets my attention is notable.  I let this one ripen for about a week too since it's for seeds, I'm really liking the dark blood color.  Honestly it really looks a lot like a Thai plant just with pendulant larger pods and slightly larger leaves.  My two have come to a growth halt since they've got maybe 3 dozen near-ripe pods on them right now but next week I'm thinking it will shoot off again after I pick it clean.  I'm gonna strip any buds that are left on there too.  I may even consider overwintering the two (they're in the same pot).  Fingers crossed that we get OP F2s from them :party:
 
I REALLY like this plant!  :D
 
After struggling slightly with the insane June / early July heat, the plant is growing well and has bushed out nicely.
With the arrival of the cooler (a relative term!) monsoonal weather, It set a metric buttload of flowers. 
 
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Pods and flowers everywhere. 3 for each node.
There are dozens and dozens of small pods, and many hundreds of flowers / buds.
 
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Another typical scene...  ("Oh my god, it's full of peppers!")
 
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Mine is bushing as well right now after the first wave and is loaded with new growth and buds.  I'll add another pic here once they start to set.  It's very prolific.
 
ikeepfish said:
Mine is bushing as well right now after the first wave and is loaded with new growth and buds.  I'll add another pic here once they start to set.  It's very prolific.
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"Very" is an understatement! I have two of these guys in my garden and I can't use them fast enough. I've been making jelly with them (first batch had 8 peppers, second had 9 and still could've used more kick) but I can only eat so much jelly and I only know a couple people who are at all interested in spicy things. I don't know what to do with all my little dragons! They sure are excellent in scramble
 
Here's my dragon cayenne. It's full of pods and lots more are setting. Taste and heat are similar to my regular cayenne. Pod has slightly tough, crunchy skin. Pods are a smaller than cayenne, and grow upwards. Probably good for any recipes that call for cayenne or thai peppers. 
 
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Ok I'm an idiot! I have a plant like that labeled 'golden cayenne'. The one I have labeled 'dragon cayenne' must really be the golden. I only have one ripe pod and it's really small. 
 
ikeepfish said:
mind showing us a pic?  If you want I can send you some F2 seeds because mine looks just like geonerd's does.
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The Dragon seems a lovely strain.
 
I'm thinking that seeds for this variety may become popular around here  (If they are viable. Any reason they wouldn't be?)
hottoddy said:
Here's my dragon cayenne. It's full of pods and lots more are setting. Taste and heat are similar to my regular cayenne. Pod has slightly tough, crunchy skin. Pods are a smaller than cayenne, and grow upwards. Probably good for any recipes that call for cayenne or thai peppers. 
 
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Interesting that they all grow 'up.'  My plant doesn't seem to care in the least which direction the pods are pointed.  Is this variability pretty common with a presumably new hybrid?
 
Mine all point up. It may be unstable and show variations. I think we all bought these on impulse from Burpee retailers throughout the US. Who knows how long the developed it?
 
Burpee?  Mine came from Bonnie Plants.  like geonerd, my plant tends to put off pots whatever direction it feels like, however, they mostly tend to be pendulant.  The plants sold at the major hardware stores are all likely F1--vendors tend to do that to prevent people from growing them out from seed.
 
Since they are likely F1 it seems very unusual that you would have upright pods unless you got a mislabeled Thai plant.
 
 
also, no reason the seeds would be inviable and I think the similarities between Thai and Cayenne would make for a lot less variations in the stabilization process.
 
ikeepfish said:
Burpee?  Mine came from Bonnie Plants.  ...
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Sorry. Yes, I meant Bonnie (purchased at Home Depot). My last post was done quickly via phone. I'm definitely going to save seed and see what happens next year. Mine is very ornamental - a few in the front yard might look good if it stays the same.
 
Some back yard plant breeders have discovered that many hybrids, are not really hybrids. Or if they are, the two parents are so similar in characteristics that they seem to breed true through many, many generations. I've taken the label of hybrids with a grain of salt and save seed any way just to see what happens.
 
The tomato Legend, bred at Oregon State University is labeled a hybrid in a UK seed catalog. It is not a hybrid.
 
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