Hot Pepper Research and Development

[ddsack]

Craig, we were posting at the same time, so I didn't see your long informative update til after I did mine. Yes, this is fun to see so many variations. Too bad all the participants can't get together for salsa tasting, eh? Maybe those of you that can get to the various regional tomato tastings can do a salsa test? Course, to be fair you'd have to only use the same kind of tomatoes in the salsas.

I have some extra room in the garden, so I do intend to grow out all the pepper plants just to see what the fruit looks and tastes like. And keep a few in pots for speedier maturity. l I am not used to bagging blossoms and have only saved pepper seed a few times, but will try to do better with these. It's fun to see everyone's pictures and compare progress.

[Barbee]

Today's photos.
Pepper 1 with the green foliage and bi colored flowers also has bi colored peppers. If you look dead center of the photo then down just a tad, you'll see the green pepper starting to grow


Another Pepper 1 has Purple/Green foliage, bi colored flowers and peppers that are so dark purple, they look black. This one is really putting on peppers.


Pepper 8 plant has green foliage, white flowers, and these finger shaped yellow peppers. Sticking up like that, it appears to be flipping the bird The larger pepper is almost the size of my thumb


Pepper 47 has purple/green foliage, bi colored blooms and no peppers forming still. It gets some shade in the evenings where the other peppers are in sun all day, so that might be why they're not putting on fruit yet?

How will I know when these things are ripe enough to eat?

[nctomatoman]

Barbee, I am thinking that the purple foliaged pepper 1 is going to be very similar to what I saved as Pepper 1 last year. Your pepper 8 may or may not be similar to pepper 8 last year - the fruit the seed came from were about 3-4 inches long and pendant (hung down on the plant), and went from pale yellow to lavender.

As far as when to eat - any time! All of these will end up red when absolutely ripe/ready for saving seed from, but you can eat them at any time. Beware the heat, though!

[rutabagaboy]

First photo - Hot Pepper 14 - my plant 2, white flower with purple tips (the color is more pronounced when the flower is viewed from behind).

Second photo - Hot Pepper 38 - my plant 3, purple flower.

Third photo - Hot Pepper 38 - my plant 9, purple flower.

[rutabagaboy]

First photo - Hot Pepper 1 - my plant 2, purple flower.

Second photo - Hot Pepper 1 - my plant 8, white flower with purple trim.

Of the 33 hot peppers I have in containers four have not yet set buds, 11 have set flowers and none have set fruit. The early autumn weather we've been having for the last week isn't encouraging anything in the garden - except the squash.

[rutabagaboy]

First photo - Hot Pepper #1, my plant 7, purple flower.

Second photo - Hot Pepper #14, my plant 5, purple flower.

Third photo - Hot Pepper #38, my plant 10, purple flower.

Fourth photo - Hot Pepper #14, my plant 7, yellow fruit with purple tip.

Fifth photo - Hot Pepper #14, my plant 11, yellow fruit.

[rutabagaboy]

Because I didn't provide a sharp photo of the yellow fruit with a purple dusting on Hot Pepper #14-11 yesterday, I'm starting out with a better shot - first photo.

Second photo - Hot Pepper #14, my plant 6, purple flower.

Third photo - Hot Pepper #1, my plant 5, yellow fruit with no purple.

[ddsack]

rbboy - those are looking really good. You will have full sized pepper shots to show us in no time! It will be really interesting to see if those little yellow peppers change color and shape as they get eating size. Nice pictures!

[rutabagaboy]

Thank you. Here are some more photos for your enjoyment:


First photo (on top line) and sixth photo (on bottom line) are the front and rear respectively of the flower on Hot Pepper 38, my plant 7. They show that there is a difference in color that depends on the view point of the observer. The front view shows a magenta flower while the rear view shows white with purple margins.

Second photo; Hot Pepper 14, my plant 9, white flower with heavy purple trim.

Third photo; Hot Pepper 14, my plant 3, white flower with purple trim.

Fourth photo; Hot Pepper 1, my plant 12, purple flower.

Fifth photo; an update of Hot Pepper 14, my plant 7 from post #156 (above). There are two fruits in this photo. The lower one is a couple of days older than the top one. The photo shows that the yellow pepper with a purple tip is swiftly becoming a purple pepper with a yellow base. I suspect the newer pepper faces the same fate.

[nctomatoman]

These things, once they are ready, start throwing flowers like crazy, and the fruit come quickly after that. I will wait another week or so before my next full update, but things are really popping out there! The color changes these will go through will be pretty interesting to watch (not all of them of course - that's the fun, spotting the ones we each like best).

I have 74 plants from this project growing that were planted on May 7. I added an additional 13 yesterday after looking at the remaining seedlings and spotting a few more distinct types. Of the original 74 plants, of which 49 have open flowers, 21 have buds and 4 are just starting to form tiny buds. There are small to tiny fruit now on 26 of the plants - just about all are starting out pale yellow or pale yellow green, and some are turning various shades of purple or lavender.

Here is a look at my two rows of these experimental hots.

[nctomatoman]

Today I did another look through how mine are fruiting and looked back on the source plant from last year. I can't make any confirmations yet, but at this point, some "estimated" conclusions as to whether I am seeing what I saw last year, so successfully reproducing last year's result this year.

Pepper 7: at least one of my three plants (my 2009 plant 3) looks promising.

Pepper 11: My 2009 peppers 6 and 6a look promising.

Pepper 8: My 2009 pepper 8a looks promising.

Pepper 14: My 2009 pepper 18 looks very similar - which is great. This is what I've been aiming to stabilize as "Bouquet:

Pepper 1: My 2009 pepper 48 looks promising - this is a very attractive pepper plant when young...it may not exactly be the same, but we shall see!

Pepper 9: My 2009 pepper 58 looks promising.

Pics to follow at some point (maybe when they get a bit bigger). Any that I've not commented on, it is too soon to draw any conclusions.

[Barbee]

Craig this latest pepper on #8 has a purple patch on it. The older pepper is still solid yellow but this one has a touch of color. Excuse the blur, it's a little windy outside

[rutabagaboy]

New items:

Photo 1, Hot Pepper 1, my plant 10, white flower with purple trim. This is the lowest point on any of the my Hot Peppers for the appearance of the first flower

Photo 2, Hot Pepper 14, my plant 4, white flower with purple trim.

Photo 3, Hot Pepper 14, my plant 2, green fruit (to the right of the open white flower).

Updates:

Photo 4, Hot Pepper 14, my plant 11, fruit was yellow with a dusting of purple, now green with dusting of purple.

Photo 5, Hot Pepper 1, my plant 5, fruit was yellow, now green.

[Penny]

Mine are no where near that, we have had so much rain, but i will get some pics on the weekend and post them.

[WVTomatoMan]

The founding members of the Pepper Pack did a tasting of some of the peppers. Here are the results*:

#14 Plant 1:
Taste: Standard small pepper taste like Tabasco and the like.
Heat: Surprisingly warm for such a small pepper. 2 of 3 gave it a medium 1 said medium/hot.

#14 Plant 2:
Taste: Objectionable.
Heat: Deceptive heat, starts mild ends medium/hot. It was the hottest of all the peppers.

#14 Plant 3:
Taste: Best of all the 14s, much like a Tabasco pepper.
Heat: Decent heat in the medium to medium/hot range.

#9 Plant 1:
Taste: Green taste.
Heat: Mild/medium.

#37 Plant 1:
Taste: Very green. Bitter. No redeeming qualities.
Heat: Mild.

*Note: Heat is relative. The heat criteria we used was uncorked grocery store green Jalapenos are very mild. Bulgarian Carrots and Ring of Fire peppers are hot. Habaneros and hotter are in the super hot category.

Also we should note that a couple of people stopped by while we were doing our thing and tried the peppers. The non pepper people off the street so to speak thought the peppers were very hot.

Randy