[Market-farming] starting pepper plants
Angela Hemwall
Angela at PierpontFarms.com
Thu May 7 21:45:54 EDT 2009
> Interesting.
> Ange
>
> Agreed on heat being the key to quick germination with peppers. After getting
> no germination on some peppers planted earlier in cooler conditions, at the
> last possible moment for pepper planting I presprouted mine -- presoaked and
> then downloaded into a coffee filter. I write the seed name and date on the
> filter before adding the seeds. Folded the moist coffee filter and seeds, and
> put them into a ziplock.
>
> Now not everyone will be able to be as high tech as I am. I then placed the
> seeds in a cabinet on top of the blueray disc player, under the TIVO unit and
> closed the cabinet door. The seeds were sprouted in no more than 4-5 days I
> planted shallowly and the green parts came up within about 3 or less days,
> 100%.
>
> To quantify what I had just done, I placed a thermometer in the cabinet with
> the door closed and it hit 100 degrees. Open, it was only about 70.
>
> I also tried to presprout some old candlelight peppers that had not been
> stored properly. I presoaked, heated, soaked again in 1 tsp fish
> hydrolysate and 1 cup water (they got white as if about to sprout), TIVO'd
> some more, and finally put the baggie on a heating mat that I knew was "hot".
> Well, came back the next day and the water in the bag with the seeds was
> steaming. Uh Oh. Got out the thermometer. I can't tell you how hot it was
> -- the thermometer pegged at 120 degrees.
>
> Not willing to assume they'd been steamed or parboiled, I put the seeds into a
> container of moist seedling mix, lightly covered, and left them to their own
> devices. Several have now sprouted, in spite of the hot water treatment. It
> is not recommended to emulate this second method - It's not a high germination
> rate - maybe 25 per cent - but it was an experiment anyhow (and then some...).
>
> I would definitely presprout again -- it is space efficient to presprout the
> peppers and uses less energy to sprout the seeds and plant than to heat dozens
> of trays.
>
> Chris Reid
> Stamford, CT
>
>
>
>
>
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