Re: [CH] Info needed
Celeste or Dave Anderson (chilehed1@powernet.net)
Mon, 7 Dec 1998 17:15:27 +0000
Snip
> And now my questions.
>
>
>
> -- ESBs and RHs are made into seperate ristras and hang to dry inside the
> house. ESBs dry like a peach ;) but RHs are taking forever. In fact
> there;s not a single RH dry yet. They are now starting to wrinkle a bit,
> but they are still soft and one has rotten or something, two weeks ago.
> Like I said they're more meaty than the ESBs.
> Is there some trick that'll do the trick for the RHs? Nope , no dehydrator
> here.(room temp is aprx. 70 F)
Best method is a dehyrdrator, but ovens work well too. I've found
that when drying orange habs in the dehydrator, they keep their nice
orange color better when sliced in half. They also take less time to
dry. I then grind them into powder.
>
> -- Pruning. To prune or not to prune? When should I prune? How much?
> Should I wait until leaves are dropped? Should I do it before leaves
> are dropped? Does it matter ?
> The pots will overwinter outside in the veranta. Current temps are
> 45-65 F. The ESBs still have almost all of their leaves while the RH
> has dropped half of them, mostly the lower ones. They are bald.(I keep
> hearing that Habs drop their leaves, true?)
They always drop their leaves on me, but they always grow back.
>
> -- The ESB seeds from Tough Love were a bit pinkish colored but it seemed
> like they were painted with a sprayer (the color is not uniform, there
> are areas that are the usual yellowish color). The seeds from my ESBs
> are yellowish (dry seeds I mean - fresh seeds from red pod are whiteish)
> What gives? I know my seeds are true cause they were taken from the first
> ESB pods that were harvested long before RHs even flowered.
> Were the Tough Love seeds treated or something (David?)
Some of the seeds which I sell are treated. If treated, they normally
are treated with a mild fungicide called Thiram or a weak Chlorine
solution or both. One company dyes their treated seed pink or red,
but others treat seeds and don't dye them. I'm going to be adding a
couple of Habanero varieties, one from West Africa and the other from
the Caribbean by way of France. The phytosanitary certificate says
they have been treated with Thiram and Maliathon (an insecticide).
This is the first time I've run into insecticide treated seeds and
I'll be darned sure it says so on my web site and the label.
>
> -- Where does one find silica gel? What sort of stores sell it I mean?
Stores that specialize in crafts or dried flowers often have silica
gel. There other dessicants available too.
>
> -- ESB pod shape is like a small UFO :) only not that flat, while RH look
> like a usual Hab (as seen in pics)only they're a bit pointed at the end.
> The strange thing is that a month ago I had to move the RH closer to the
> ESBs like this -> ESBESB_ESBESB_RHRH
> pot1 pot2 pot3
> to a point where pot2 right ESB touches pot3 left RH. The pods that came
> from this particular RH (and are still coming) look like a mutant between
> the two species. Top half pretty wideish like the ESB only bigger and
> bottom half comes out of "inside" the top half and is elongated pointed
> and narrow like the RH. Also the pod has many deep and sharp bumps .
> The pod looks almost like the Jamaican Sc. Bon. pic that used to be on the
> Tough Love home page. (Maybe still is)
>
> ___|___
> ( ) ___|___ __|__
> Mut (__ __) ESB / \ RH / \
> ( ) \______/ (_ _)
> \./ (.)
>
> I know crossing only happens to seed so that plant from that seed grows
> a F1 hybrid next year, but this seems too much a coincidense. Any ideas?
As Jim Campbell said, there are a lot of variations, even on the same
plant with any of these varieties. They are not f1 hybrids.
I hope Jim C. read this far. When we were in Jamaica and in several
e-mails we've talked about sweet peppers that suddenly got hot. We
are pretty much convinced that a sweet pepper pollinated by a hot
pepper will not produce hot fruit in the same generation, but here's
another idea and it's not original although I don't know the source:
The non-domesticated peppers were hot. Over time breeders tried to
get fruits that were bigger, sweeter, different shapes, etc. They
most likely did this by selecting fruits and keeping seeds from the
fruits that pleased them. Now lets say that the gene which controls
Capsiacin production is pretty much recessive. It's called the
knucledragger gene by the way.
Since the knuckledragger gene is recessive, it doesn't show up often,
but show up it does. Something to think about.
Sorry I wasn't able to answer your questions during the weekend.
Dave Anderson
Tough Love Chile Co.
http://www.tough-love.com