Homegrown Peppers

Posts Tagged ‘Growing Peppers’

Planting pepper seeds is pretty easy.  Sure, all you need to do is put the pepper seed in soil, cover it and water it, but there are a few more steps along the way that can up the germination rate of your pepper seeds.  Let’s take a quick look.

Seed-Starting Medium

I can’t remember the last time I planted a pepper seed outdoors, directly into the soil.  The germination rate is really poor that way, and seed-starting medium (“soil”) is a much better bet.

Go to your local garden center and locate some seed-starting soil.  You can use straight sphagnum moss (finely chopped) or sphagnum and vermiculite combined, if you can’t find a ready-made seed-starting medium.

Do not use gaden soil directly; there are too many bacteria, spores and whatnot in it; fine for older transplants, not so great for seeds.

Containers for Planting Seeds

You’ll see in the two videos that I’ve used plain paper cups (“Dixie cups”) for my containers.  Cheap and easy to find, you can poke holes in the bottom for drainage, and when it comes time for planting, the cup tears away from the soil very easily.

Planting Pepper Seeds Videos

Here are two videos I made on planting pepper seeds.  The first one goes over supplies; the second is the actual technique.  And after the second video, I’ll list where you can get some of the supplies online, if you can’t find them locally.

Enjoy!

And here’s part 2 of how to plant pepper seeds.

Pepper Growing Supplies Online

First check your local garden center; depending on where you live, they may have most or all of what I used. If not, here are some places online where I have bought my supplies.

Earthworm Castings: Gardens Alive! and

Windowsill Greenhouse: and Amazon

Pepper Seeds: Seed Saver’s Exchange, Tomato Grower’s Supply, and Amazon

Fish Fertilizer: Amazon and

You can probably find most of this at your local gardening center, but if you can’t (I’ve always had to order my earthworm castings online), you have some places you can check out.

I’ve got a bounty of peppers now, of bell, sweet and hot.  The peppers are in full production mode!  I took a quick break to walk out to the garden for a harvest.

Bell, Sweet and Hot Peppers (Click for larger image)

Once I got the peppers inside and on the counter, I thought they looked really pretty, so I took a photo.  And keep in mind, this isn’t all of the peppers — many have already found their way into our tummies.  Not to mention there are a ton still on the plants!

In the photo I have Park’s Sweet Banana, Park’s Sweet Pickle, Mini-Belle (in purple and red), Redskin (mostly green), a name-unknown bell and a Cambuci (very hot!).  I’m waiting to taste the Cambuci before writing up a post on it, but it’s a really pretty plant and pepper.

A bounty of peppers indeed!

Still Planting Peppers

I’ve got another round of peppers to plant this weekend.  Here in Florida, there’s still plenty of time to get in a second crop.  So what’s on my agenda?  Here’s what I have in mind, but it’s always subject to change.

• Datil
• Aurora
• Purple Jalapeno
• Jaloro (yellow jalapeno)
• Redskin (again — this is one nice bell pepper!)
• Starburst (ornamental pepper)
• Giant Anconcagua (again — absolutely huge sweet peppers!)

I might also go with another round of Pretty Purple Pepper and one of the Thai Hot varieties.  I’m also debating adding a larger bell pepper to the list, or maybe Mohawk (the companion to Redskin).

So if you live in a climate where it’s warm (days at least in the 70′s) on up through October or November, come on and plant some more seeds!  Or at least see if there are any plants for sale available nearby.

And for the rest of you who already have peppers out in the garden — may you have a bounty of peppers as well!