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GyO presents: '24 BONNET BONANZA + revenge of the fifth

confession: your very own @growyourown calls himself a pepper lover and has never grown scotch bonnets! BLASPHEMOUS, i know; i intend to rectify this in 2024. i have several varieties to try, and am excited to do so. i just gotta write this now partially because i have the seeds and i'm excited, and also because if i get this intro crap out of the way, it's a quick post to make once i actually drop seeds over christmas.

scotchdc.jpg

HERE'S THE SEEDS I BOUGHT FOR THE YEAR (note asterisks):
bonnets:
scotch bonnet trinidad red 900k *
scotch brains yellow 1M+
scotch bonnet 6-colour mix:
--choc/peach/red/orange/yellow/safi
others:
chin – fatalii yellow 900k
chin – congo black X butch t choc 1.1M **
pube – rocoto giant yellow 50k
frut – hijo puta madre 80k
frut – malaga bird 100+k ***

asterisks:
* did not come with the order. fast email communication resolved they would re-send this item.
** pacakge said "7pot congo red x butch t" not black x choc, this was my requested bonus item, so okay if it wasn't exactly what i wanted.
*** came as "malawi bird's eye", possibly annuum not frut. makes my side quest of all five harder, mentioned the likely alphabetical order accident in the email, hoping they resend this one too, but not holding my breath.

so here we go, projected sow schedule:

dec 31:
TRAY I
6x giant yellow P
6x rio hualaga P (‘23)
TRAY II
6x puta F
6x malaga F
TRAY III
6x e.p.f.h. P
3x purira F
3x lotah bih F

jan 27:
TRAY IV
4x bonnet yellow C
4x bonnet orange C
4x bonnet red C
TRAY V
4x bonnet safi C
4x bonnet choc C
4x bonnet peach C
TRAY VI
4x bonnet trinidad red C
4x scotch brains C
4x fatalii yellow C
TRAY VII
-failures from jan 1? (must succeed with frutescens for all five)
-others from previous years? (superhots?)
-bahamian goat '21 (if they are technically bonnets then i'm not a total virgin)

feb-mar:
baccatums - srp, aji cito, aji omnicolour
annuums - jalapenos et al.

keepcalms.png

wish me luck and let's have a toast to a prolific 2024 season, and to celebrating happy holidays together with family.

cheers friends, see you with seeds in soon, hot peppers-ho!
-GyO
 
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Click to expand...
thanks guys for your support.

small update:

ordered seeds 10 nov, received 24 nov

emailed about missing and wrong seeds 25 nov

emailed again 20 dec saying i hadn't seen anything show up.

recevied reply 21 dec apologizing and saying due to holdiays it may take longer for items to arrive (but didn't confirm if/when anything was sent), but due to my recomplaining about getting a wrong variety in addition to a missed one, he said he would send the correct one (malaga bird) as well as the missed one (s.b. trinidad red) to me.

now, we wait. in the meantime, i am trying to expedite the disassembly and putting away of the christmas decorations and gifts to make room to start my seeds. :)
 
the following seeds are down as of the evening of dec 30th!

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used my usual boring unadventurous method of soak h2o2/water 24h, plant 1/4-1/2" deep in the classic green plastic 12-cell trays with vented domes filled with standard miracle gro potting soil.

didn't pull the trigger on any thermostat for the heat mats, doubled over tea towel on the mat because they run at like 35c.

i had a thread about this, and thanks to everyone for their input there. sounds like the inkbird has been pretty solid for people and i'll likely grab one for next year, or sooner if i do incredibly poorly in the next little bit here.

another question, dear readers: you don't need to puts lights on the trays until something actually hooks, right? do some of you just do it anyways, for "positive encouragement"? and definitely my light does not emit much heat to contribute in that way.

i'll keep y'z'all posted with any developments.

-GyO
 
Good luck with germination! I have seeds for the Purira, but haven't grown it yet myself. I'll be curious how it does for you.

I typically germinate without light because it's more convenient. At times I've put them under lights just because I had the space available. I've never noticed any improved effectiveness with light and I've done quite a lot of each. The moment I see a decent hook though they go under the lights.
 
thanks CD. i thought so re: lights, but never hurts to ask.

purira was on my grow list for last year, and i got nothing. (see last year's glog, i failed at frutescens).

no germination on the first run of 6 seeds.

then on the second try i had some come up (2 i think?) but they and the rest of the sprouts that were up got uprooted by my curious toddler. i stuck them back into cells and prayed, but i didn't know what was what anymore, and ultimately of all those that survived this attack, none were purira or lotah bih.

hence why i am trying them again this year (also because my malaga bird didn't arrive in time to be part of this round).

i hope i get something this year; down to only 4-5 seeds left for those.
 
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I have always had a light for starting seeds. Just thought the light was part of the equation.
Perhaps I was wrong. It's just where I start the seeds there are the heating cables/pad, light & water.

I do know now that CD has had just as good germination with or without light. Good enough for me.


simplifygardening.com

Do Seeds Need Light or Dark to Germinate? - Simplify Gardening

Most seeds prefer to germinate in a wholly dark environment. However, some species, including some flowering plants, like at least some light to successfully incubate. It is, in fact, safe to say that different plant species require varying light conditions to activate favorable seed germination.
simplifygardening.com simplifygardening.com
 
Some flowers do need it and one of them is this beautiful thing!
Alissa Lisianthus - The Special Flower | Sakata Ornamentals

Just look at it, it's gorgeous. Image taken from the google. Lisianthus is it's name. I've always wanted to grow some but it's hard and I don't have a space for it.
Sorry of the offtopic. 😅
 
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alright, so here's the update. after just one week i had my first emergences on the night of the 6th, radical. more have come to the party during this second week as well. let's see who they are:

name [species] (dates up) total/sown
hijo puta madre [Frut?] (6*,6**,6,7,9) 5/6
lotah bih [Frut] (8,8) 2/3
ecuadorian pepper from hell [Pube] (8) 1/8
rocoto giant yellow [Pube] (8***,8,9,9,10,10) 6/8
rio hualaga -from grow [Pube] (12) 1/4
rio hualaga [Pube] () 0/4
purira [Frut] () 0/3

almost every type planted is represented, but we also have some early casualties.
* withered, lack of water on the 10th, looks done for
** cut off under the cotys by daughter knocking dome lid while playing on the 11th, is it even possible for a plant come back from this?
*** i ripped off cotys while dislodging a helmet on the 9th, appears to be regrowing healthily

24traypic2.png


off to a good start, i reckon. 6/8 on the giant yellow is exciting; i'm keen to try that one for sure. 8/24 total pubes not great, but hopefully more are still to come.

we just had a snowstorm cause us to lose power, house got down to 17c, power restored after 5 hours, didn't have to go to bed worrying over seeds getting too chilly.

that's all i've to report for now, my brethren
-GyO
 
update on the missing seeds:

finally got an envelope in the mail this week containing the s.b. trinidad red, and malawi bird.

so they got it wrong again, unless malaga bird is just a typo or that they really are synonymous with one another. this time though, the malawi bird says "C.baccatum" on it, where last time it was labeled "malawi bird's eye" with no species listed.

in the first email about missing seeds i wanted to confirm if the hijo puta madre (which said annuum on the label) and the erroneously sent malawi were in fact frutescens, as that was entirely the only reason i wanted to purchase either of those, and in the reply it was like "it is a frutescens, but crossed with baccatum, or so they say" but without reference as to which variety he was answering about.

also the s.b. trinidad says 150-300k on the label, but the website was claiming 900k, so i've no idea how hot these will be. makes me less inclined to think the trinidad refers to scorpion, though, and that it's possibly just a scotch bonnet grown from trinidad or crossed with any one of the native trini peppers.

also got a little card saying use such-and-such code on your next order
 
graduates:

potted-up some of the sprouts that were getting too big for the tiny cell trays. 14 moved on up to 4" pots.

also had some new germs since last post, so there are still 11 smaller seedlings chillin in the cells, along with 10 no-shows and one standing dead (complete decapitation by dome lid). the dry withered one has made it back to life and is starting to make a leaf, and the botched helmet removal had stalled but is showing signs of coty regrowth.

in this vein, i feel like i have to be more ruthless in culling runt plants, so those two are probably not going to pot up.

this weekend i plan to sow all the bonnets and a couple others, so at that time i will take whatever's in the cell trays and pot out to a 4" pot or 9oz. cup, or just cut them if they look too weak.

26/36 total germ rate, just over 70% is good for me, and even if i only keep around 20 or fewer of those, that will still be lots of pubes and hopeful fruts for this year's grow. if the "malawi bird" i got twice but didn't order is indeed frutescens, i plan to drop 6-8 of those in the upcoming sow as well, but it's sad not knowing if it and the "hijo puta madre" are even, in fact, fruts to help me complete my vendetta side-quest.

in other frut pros and cons, got 3/3 lotah bih to come up and since up-potted, but 0/3 appearance by purira.

here's the pictorial of who is alive and who got up-potted, as well as an actual current pic of the table:
24traypic3.png



IMG_20240124_215409.jpg


well, how do you like that for an actual content-containing post?

IT BEGINS!!!

-GyO
 
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new seeds down as of last night, jan 28th:

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did up-pot everything else before dropping these new ones. almost ran out of potting mix for the new trays. when this next batch graduates i might have to go rob soil out of the planters outside, or pay $10 per 8L bag for this miracle-gro again (i swear it was like $6.50 last year).

i really wanted to cut some weak plants, but i didn't have the balls. i potted 3 runts to a single 4" pot for each e.p.f.h. and rocoto giant yellow, and a single rio hualaga into a 9oz cup, and we'll see if any of them prove worth keeping.

couldn't be arsed to take a head count right now of the total numbers of each variety in the pots, but there are something like 18-20 total.

need some good vibes, mon, for the bonnet seeds!

-GyO
 
thanks paul.

i have only ever ordered from atlantic (pepperseeds.ca), 4 times in total.

this is the only time they made any errors on my order, but at least they attempted to make good on it.

i'm thinking about trying to get on board the seed train this or next year, but i don't feel that i have enough variety/quantity to contribute anything meaningful yet.
 
quick picless update:

half the new crop are up. notably, the bonnet six-variety-pack has a great overall percentage, the fatalii are 100% 4/4, and scotch brains conversely sucking with 0% 0/4. but it's not been two weeks since sow, more may come yet.

24traypic5.png

totals:
s.b. red 4/4
s.b. choc 3/4
s.b. orange 3/4
s.b. peach 1/4 (weak, due to bad helmet)
s.b. safi 3/4
s.b. yellow 3/4 (2 weak, cotys malformed)

s.b. trin red 2/4
s. brains yellow 0/4
fatalii yellow 4/4
congo butch 1/4
malawi 5/8

bonnet medley: 17/24, 71%
all scotch types: 19/32, 59%
overall: 25/48 52%

almost all those from the first round that made it into the 4" pots are looking good and healthy. a couple had stalled so i culled them and moved the best of the tripled-up runts into their pots.

i promise pics next time

-GyO
 
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