Started my 2011 season today!

[wordwiz]

For the last three years, I always start my superhot peppers on December 26. I grew the Bhut Jolokia a couple of years ago, the 7-pod last year. My son has been pestering me to grow more BJs as he claims he knows lots of people who want to buy them. I've had great luck getting ripe pods when I start seeds in December, so figured I might as well try again.

Sowed a total of 40 seeds: 20 in a Speedling tray filled with potting mix, and 10 each in Bio-Dome inserts and Oasis Horticubes. They are now sitting on a waterbed heater set at 85 degrees.

I really need to find out which media works the best. In the past, I would mass sow them in tray, wait until they germinated and grew a bit, then transplant them into 18 cell nursery flats. But because I need to start way more plants this year, I want to find a different media. By the time I get into the serious seed starting (early to mid-March) I should have a great idea how they will work.

My hope is the horticubes - I can start 4,000 plants for about $90. Way cheaper than any other option.

Mike

[garden5]

Glad to see your 2011 season is beginning!

Let us know what medium works best. I've always used compost-dirt with pretty good results. I think soil temperature has much more to do with germination rates than soil medium. However, I have read that sand is very detrimental to seed-germination for peppers.

[shelleyinmichigan]

This holiday I was blessed with a second greenhouse and a few seed starting systems complete with propogation/heat mats so I am totally geeked to get going............in Zone 5......on December 27th!!

My cousin provided me with some hot pepper seeds last season, one of which was the 'ghost pepper', along with a caribbean red. Our season just doesn't seem long enough to get a good pepper harvest, although I've seen some fine specimens from other people around here. Perhaps it's just me getting such a late start.

But with my new toys I'm going to set up in the corner of my living room once I get the Christmas tree down and see if I can pamper some bhuts into juveniles, and by the time they're adults they should be able to go outside on their own. I also have a hankering for sweet green, jalapeno (cream cheese stuffed!), cayenne, and tangerine dream.

[wordwiz]

Shelly,

I'm in Cincy and I found that starting the seeds at the end of December, at least for superhots such as Bhuts and 7-pods. Did it the past two years and had ripe pods in early August. The year before I started in early February and though the plants looked nice, they were just starting to set pods when the frost hit (late September).

Mike

[Avonnow]

How do you like the Bio Dome, I have one I picked out from PARK seed today after reading all kind of reviews on Amazon and different seed companies, I wanted durability (to last a few years) many said scertain ones were cheaper and would tear or rip. Others have heating pads, some don't - Any suggestions?

[rainbowgardener]

Shelly,

I'm in Cincy and I found that starting the seeds at the end of December, at least for superhots such as Bhuts and 7-pods. Did it the past two years and had ripe pods in early August. The year before I started in early February and though the plants looked nice, they were just starting to set pods when the frost hit (late September).

Mike

I'm in Cincinnati too. It would be very unusual for us to get frost in Sept. Not saying it's never happened of course, but not what you need to plan for. Our average first frost date is Oct 15 and that's based on historical averages. In these warmer times, it's probably later than that.