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Post by macmex on Nov 19, 2019 9:01:24 GMT -6
Here's a link to The Chile Man dot org website. It drops you into his discussion of hybridizing chilis, but there is a good chart which tells about the results of intra species (between different species) crosses of peppers. I can't recall if I've frequented this website before, but what I observed here was excellent.
Guide to Crossing Peppers
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Post by glen on Nov 20, 2019 1:01:47 GMT -6
That is a very good article. However, I wish that peppers didn't cross so easily. Its hard to grow peppers and save seed for sharing that you are sure has not been crossed. Especially when you grow a mix of variety's and they are close together. I have to make sure and voice a disclaimer with any seed I share that it is always possible that a cross has occurred. Its just part of pepper growing.
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Post by john on Nov 20, 2019 6:33:16 GMT -6
If I have a concern about a seed perhaps needing a little more drying time. I will use paper seed packets. Any moisture left in the seed will be able to escape through the paper.
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Post by macmex on Nov 20, 2019 8:21:52 GMT -6
Yes, packaging in paper, is a good idea, if there is any doubt about the seed being all the way dry.
Glen, it is my belief that it can take a person some years to figure out what is acceptable or not, for isolation/protection of pollination in any garden plant, used for seed saving. Conditions vary so much between regions and localities within them.
If pure seed is the goal, the best thing to do is what I am doing. I am limiting myself to three peppers, all of different species and giving them isolation space anyway (normally). If I were to introduce another pepper, I could plant it 200-300' away from the other peppers. I have a couple of gardens scattered around the property.
Except in a situation with "extreme pollinators" one could generally afford to experiment a bit. My limited experience with crosses showed me that it wasn't hard for me to re-select back to the non crossed variety. But that's because I don't grow more than one variety of a given species. During late summer I have actually observed honey bees working my pepper flowers. Native bees are much much more inclined to work them (and beans, and tomatoes, etc.)
My garden is especially bad for bean cross pollination. I've had beans cross, which were planted 40' apart. Planted at 15' distance, I had something like 3% crossing one year (An Experiment with Bean Crosses). I would love to grow at least a dozen varieties in a given year, but I've found that I need to limit myself, for preservation's sake. On the other hand, I do realize that all that crossing is also potential for breeding.
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Post by glen on Nov 21, 2019 16:53:36 GMT -6
George, I can't limit myself to 3 variety's in one season. Peppers are one of the few veggy's that I can grow successfully where I live. There are too many pepper variety's that are cool and enjoyable to grow and not enough time to grow all of them. I still don't know which variety's I actually want to grow either. My Thai hot pepper variety is one of the variety's I can't live without. I need a keeper jalepeno variety. And, I need a sweet chinense of course like Arroz con Pollo. Then there is that super hot variety. I have to have that. And, on and on. I plan to try and use hair net bags to isolate blooms on important variety's later to save seed. But, no. Limit the variety's? Impossible. Limiting fun is not something easy for me to do.
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Post by rdback on Nov 21, 2019 19:29:34 GMT -6
3 pepper plants?!?
Surely you jest George.
Anyway, Glen, I stumbled across this silica product while perusing SESE website. Looks like those in "damp" areas use it to dry seeds. I have no experience with it, but I thought you might want to read about it.
Orange-to-Green Color Indicating Loose Silica Gel Beads
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Post by glen on Nov 22, 2019 0:38:34 GMT -6
Loose Silica Beads? Where would someone find that in a third world country? Surely you jest!!!
Oh, sorry. I am being politically incorrect. I meant Developing Country. I don't want to offend anyone.
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Post by macmex on Nov 22, 2019 7:54:05 GMT -6
Years ago I simply saved the silica packets from vitamin jars and medicine bottles. I'd recharge (dehydrate) them in the oven, using it's pilate light. In Panama, I suspect you may not have an oven. But if you have a car or access to one, you could crack the windows a inch or two and set silica packets on a tray, on the seat, during the hot time of the day. That would probably do it. In lieu of a car, some kind of structure, covered in plastic would probably do the job. Since these packets don't change color, you could simply assume they need recharging between uses.
Also, if a person really wants to save pure seed, and they are more of a pepper collector than I, then I'd recommend the construction of screened or netted cages around certain plants. We have to work with what we've got. That's for sure.
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Post by rdback on Nov 22, 2019 9:15:25 GMT -6
I had never heard of these color-changing things. I thought you might find it interesting something like this existed, not to go look for them lol. Sorry, didn't mean to offend.
I agree George, we have to work with what we've got.
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Post by heavyhitterokra on Nov 22, 2019 11:54:49 GMT -6
Here in Moodys, Oklahoma (not 3rd World, but the next best thing) in lieu of silica packets, we sometimes use dried rice to draw moisture from the things that we want to remain extra dry, like the cell phone that our kids dropped in the toilet.
We placed the entire phone inside a gallon jar of dried rice with a tight fitting lid and recovered the use of it within a couple day's time. I've heard that dried beans will work too, but have never actually tried that.
My wife has also made a type of moisture preventive container by picking dead charcoal out of the ashes of our warm woodstove and placing those dried, black, pieces in a glass jar with a tight fitting lid. (You could use charcoal from a grill, in lieu of a woodstove, but only while the ashes are still too warm to draw moisure from the atmosphere.
Back in my 4-H Horticulture days, I cooked sand, in a tin can, on top of a gas stove and used it to draw moisture out of flowering plant specimens for display boards. Just pour the warm (not hot) sand about an inch or two deep into the bottom of a gallon jar, place a fresh blossom facing petals up into the sand and carefully cover the blossom with dry wood ash. Then, add a layer sand no more than 1/2" an inch deep above the wood ash. In a couple week's time, you'll have a mummified plant blossom suitable for display. Some kids used cardboad shoe boxes to hold the sand, and placed the blossoms petals down, in the sand, then covered the blossom with more sand. After two weeks, they poked holes in the bottom of the shoe box to let the sand drain out.
Some kids used Borax and cornmeal, mixed in a 1:1 ratio. (I can't recommend that though, as I've never tried it myself) I don't know if Borax would effect viability of the seeds you are trying to dry?
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Post by glen on Nov 22, 2019 17:23:33 GMT -6
I have never tried any of these new fangled idea's. This year, I have put all my pepper seed in the fridge. I have had bad experience with putting some pepper seed in the freezer. The plan is to try and get some pepper starts going this weekend. Probably about 16 to 20. Thats pretty much all I can handle. This will be the biggest dry season pepper project I have ever tried. So, I will let you know which seeds germinate and which do not. Pepper seeds are finnicky seeds to get going. Things can go wrong and usually do. I like to use a lot of seed if I have it. I can usually dazzle you with quantity better than I dazzle you with quality. Rare seed is different. Thats where I plant one or 2 in a starter pot and hope for the best. That is where the trouble usually starts. Rare seeds.
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Post by rdback on Nov 23, 2019 10:00:35 GMT -6
Hahaha Ron. You brought back memories of my Grandmother in Louisiana who always had grains of rice in the salt shaker. That's how she kept her Morton's salt from clumping back in the days before all the anti-caking stuff they add nowadays. Anyway, thanks for the memories!
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Post by glen on Nov 23, 2019 19:20:25 GMT -6
I thought people still put rice in their salt? Oh well, I guess I have been out of the country too long.
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Post by glen on Nov 23, 2019 19:32:14 GMT -6
I really do miss gardening in the US. I would buy a nice bag of name brand seed starter mix for pepper seeds. Here in Panama you work with what you got. My soil is absolutely abysmal. Full of rocks and stones and glass and concrete and clay and sand and nematodes. Yes, nematodes. My soil gets rock hard when it is dry. Today I was using a pick axe to get soil to use for starting my peppers. It is hard to believe that its possible to grow anything in the conditions I have to work with. And, its getting less cloudy. I don't believe we will get another drop of rain until sometime in early May. Maybe slightly earlier than that. And, its getting hotter. The dry season in my province is so miserably hot that I cannot describe it. By January we will get the winds. Every day, 25 mph winds coming out of the NE. Luckily I have my house set up to catch the breeze so it comes thru the house. But, its going to be extremely hot, in the 90's minimum every day. It will stay in the 90's until late in the evening. Clear sky's every day. I am going to have to place potted plants in shaded spots all over the yard. They need sun but not full sun which will cook the pots. Killing the plants. Happy times are here again. If any of the peppers survive my horrid hellfire conditions this time around you know that the seed is heat tolerant.
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