Ideally you want to get your seeds in between February and May, I was a bit late last year and while I did get some decent crops I missed out on a second batch because the nights were getting shorter.
So today I planted my seeds for this year.
I went with a few varieties, all of which were new ones this time round.
Here's what I've gone for.
I bought most of these for this years grow but the Thai Bird Peppers were sent to me by a friend who's been trying to grow them himself and failing. Hopefully I can get them to grow and fruit for him.
The large packet with the yellow label is a Trinidad Perfume. This is a Habanero variety with little to no heat! I've been meaning to track down a heatless Habanero variety for a while. I LOVE the taste of Habanero's and Scotch Bonnets but not everyone can handle the heat.
As any of you who know me will now, I do like my chilli sauces and hopefully I'll be able to make a milder one with the Trinidad Perfume fruit without compromising on flavour.
I have some Burkina Yellow Habanero seeds, these could be quite tricky to grow.
Christmas Bell AKA Ubatuba, which are a fruity tasting unusual shaped fruit.
Amazon Chile Roma, also related to the Habanero but a bit milder but with an immense amount of flavour apparently.
De Banco is a medium fiery type which is ideal for hanging baskets apparently.
Krakatoa is an Italian style plant which fruits quickly and repeatedly for a few months, ideal for a windowsill giving you a constant crop right up to Christmas and beyond if your house is warm enough.
The Ring of Fire came free with the others so I figured I'd get some of them planted too.
I'm trying a new method to get my seeds going this year because some of them are tricky to get started.
I didn't want to plant them and hope for them to grow, it's still a bit too cold for that and the windows in my flat (these will all be grown indoors) are a bit draughty until it gets warmer.
So this year I'm starting them off in a makeshift greenhouse indoors.
All you'll need to do this yourself is a deep sided dish, some clingfilm and a warm place.
I've opted for some peat moss discs to get my seeds started. They're dead cheap and you can plant them and the seedlings directly into a pot once they get growing. I got a pack of 50 for around £4.
All you have to do is add warm water to them and watch them expand. Leave them for 2 minutes and they'll be 5 times the size and nice and moist, perfect for the seeds to get started in.
Once they've expanded, pour away any excess water, you don't want them to be saturated or this could cause your seeds to go mouldy.
The image above shows a before and after shot of the peat moss discs.
As you can see they have a small hole in the top perfect for dropping a couple of seeds in to. I went for a couple in each disc because you're not guaranteed to get a healthy plant from every seed. I also planted 3 discs worth of seeds per variety.
When you cover the seeds, do it loosely. You don't want your shoots having to struggle their way through the soil above to get free.
Now you don't want to go mixing up your plants so make sure to draw up a plan of what is where.
This is important because not every type of chilli plant likes to be treated the same and you don't want to kill them off because you got your varieties mixed up.
Here's my growing plan.
You might notice an extra seed type there, 'The Dalston Mutant'. This is the 1 decent seed I got from a hybrid plant last year. I cross pollenated one variety with the pollen of another variety.
The fruit was fairly mangled looking, not at all like it's parent plant should produce but the flavour was the same. It's only when you plant the seeds the following year that you see if your hybrid has been a success or not.
The final thing to do before covering them is to give them a tiny drizzle of water, if you have a spare spray bottle then use that. You don't want them to be saturated, just moist enough that when you cover them up you'll get a bit of a steamy environment going for them to propagate.
Then cover over and leave somewhere warm for them to develop. They could take a couple of days, they could take a week and a half. Different varieties require different lengths of time to germinate.
If some don't come up then don't worry, all is not lost. This is why you kept back some seeds earlier on and also why we're planting early in the season.
Next time try with less water, or more heat, or more water, or less heat. There are obviously lots of variables to think about and you'll only really gauge these from experience.
Here's my makeshift green house with all the seeds in place. I've put this on top of my boiler but if you've got an airing cupboard that'll do nicely. The seeds don't need light to germinate, why would they? they're underground anyway!
If you're planting straight into pots then the process isn't really much different. Don't cover up your pots and keep them moist but not wet.
I'll get the next part up once the seeds start sprouting. Happy planting.
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