Chillies - what are you growing/overwintering?

[Scoot]

My Guindilla's are just starting to turn red...





My 1 sweet bell pepper is also ripening...



And finally my razzmatazz pepper plant with its two, yes two peppers...

[SusieG]

I was in GH yesterday cutting back my tom plants, including my hanging basket with 100's & 1000's - and to my surprise saw that one of my Twilight chilli plants has grown up around the basket - it's taller than me now, so over 5ft .......!!! It's also loaded with fruits!

[Jay22]

Picked my first Cayenne and first Apache yesterday...remember back when I was worried they weren't growing!

[SusieG]

-----Congrats, Jay!! . It's all very exciting - and great when you can actually start to pick your chillis ~ what on earth were we all worried about a few months back ...........

[gringo]

Sante Fe Grande are starting to ripen to orange...



and at last fruit starting to form on my (unhealthy looking) Costeno Amarillo...



No sign of any cayennes or fresnos turning yet, though lots and lots of fruit.

[Scarlet]

A couple of photos of my Jalepeno and cayennes....in dont always cover my plants with water...they are usually in big trays but I'm having a reshuffle and got trigger happy with the hose pipe



I'll be doing some preserving in the week

[gringo]

wow they look amazing!

[Scarlet]

Thank you Gringo! I'm really pleased with that Jalepeno. It's full of chilli, well worth growing those.

[NewShoots]

Jalepeno and cayennes look great Scarlet. Gonna do Jalepeno next year.

My 'Cheyenne' looks very similar pod wise, good few yellow pods on. One or two just showing abit of orange coming through now

The slug and snail issue seems to have been arrested, which is great.

Just started eating my produce with currys and tomato sauces that I'm making up really satisfying.

Looking at picking a few apache pods to save seed with today. Any tips or advice on this??

Thanks for your help

[Scarlet]

Thank you New Shoots.

Saving chilli seeds is pretty straight forward if you just grow one variety only! Chillies and peppers will cross polinate with each other so if you have more than one variety and save the seed it's a gamble what you get the following year. If you are just growing similar heat range, it probably won't matter too much! Some varieties will cross freely with other some not do much....your Aji Lemon rarely cross with any other chillies other than AJi family. So that one is a good starter to save from.
Unfortunately I think your Apache chillies are F1? Did you buy the plant or grow from seed? Have you got the label.? Any seed saved from an F1 won't be identical to the parent plant, sometimes it is fine, others you could find that the fruit tastes disgusting, looks nothing like what you had the year before or it may not fruit at all....with this in mind, personally I wouldn't try saving anything from an F1 plant. More so really with chillies as they take a long time to fruit.

To isolate your chillies to save seed, you can keep one in the house, one in the GH etc. save a pod that has flowered while other plants Werner glowering or you can stick a little bag, sow some "stockings" over the flowering branch. I use those. Wedding favour bags.

A good link here that explains it all. http://www.realseeds.co.uk/pepperseedsaving.html

[NewShoots]

Hi Scarlet.

I've had a look at the labels but they don't mention whether they're F1 or not on there. I guess most retail customers would grow them for this year and buy a new lot next year. So I'm guessing they probably are F1s, considering they came from Aldi

Yeah was aware of the cross-pollination but thought that could be interesting as I've just got Cheyenne and Apache's together. Maybe I'll just grow one on from an apache seed and see whats happens. Obviously I don't wanna invest to much time next year on growing a bunch of F1s if they all turn out dodgy.

I have a friend who has just one Hot Burrito plant in his garden. Popping over there tomorrow to take a ripe pod off in exchange for some fresh chillies.

Hmm already planning next years Grow List..

Thanks Scarlet

[Tripmeup]

your chilli's are looking very nice scarlet

Had a bit of a shuffle round in the tunnel this afternoon so some of my chillis have a bit more space, air, light round them.
that means I've managed to get a photo of my holy mole. i'm very impressed with him.

I've put my secateurs on the pot for scale, never grown such a big fat chilli

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I really love those Chilaca aka Holy Mole.Have grown them for a couple of years now and think they are so striking looking!

[jacks10]

all your chillis look amazing!

[Scarlet]

Jack, make sure you start in January this year. Get yourself a couple of pots and you can grow yours alongside us....a conservatory is a brill place for growing chillies!

[Tripmeup]

A couple of photos of my Jalepeno and cayennes....in dont always cover my plants with water...they are usually in big trays but I'm having a reshuffle and got trigger happy with the hose pipe

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I'll be doing some preserving in the week

They look great Scarlet!!
Are you finding the bigger pots are increasing yield? To my mind, they definitely are..
Presume they are yellow Jalapeno seed? Where did you get them if you don't mind me asking?