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Reply to Email from Mark Lee

 

Mark, from your question I assume that you are interested in the mechanics of the process more than the philosophy  of choosing characteristics.

 

You do not need a magnifying glass but you do need a sharp pointed tweezers, a steady hand and lots of patience and luck.

 

You choose blossoms that have not open the outer petals – using the tweezer, remove the outer petals to expose the flower parts. Remove the male portion (with the pollen) and then apply the pollen from the plant that you wish to cross. This pollen could be some that you have harvested from the Male plant and saved in a refrigerator in a container or may be from mature flowers of the plant, used fresh.

 

You need to remove all other flowers from that strig and then cover the treated flowers with a small cotton bag to prevent additional pollination from other unwanted sources. The bag needs to remain in place until the berry is ready to harvest to protect it. The seed are extracted from the berry, labeled and used to produce the new seedlings

 

Ed Mashburn