Many gardeners prefer to grow peppers in a suburban area with their own hands in order to regularly harvest ripe vegetables. You can buy or prepare planting material yourself. Some growers consider picking seeds from store-bought peppers a bad idea, but there is also the opposite opinion.
Please put your likes and subscribe to the channel "About Fasenda". This will allow us to publish more interesting garden articles.
Important nuances
Procurement of planting raw materials from purchased fruits has an advantage - it becomes possible to choose a vegetable variety that you like according to its taste and external characteristics. Gardeners are often happy with the seedlings grown from these seeds and the harvest. But in some cases, the result may not meet expectations due to the use of an unknown hybrid. There is no complete certainty that the grown specimens will repeat the parental qualities. The following features may appear when growing seeds from store peppers:
- changes in plant immunity;
- decreased concentration of nutrients;
- different thickness of the peel;
- difference in color and shape.
Even in the case of a repetition of the parental characteristics of store specimens, the grown fruits may be smaller and have low resistance to infectious diseases. In the first experiment, it is recommended to plant several seeds. This will allow you to compare the harvested crop with the parent variety.
Selection of material
For seedlings, grains are collected only from large and healthy vegetables. You can get up to 150 pieces from one copy. When buying store peppers, you need to pay attention to the following characteristics:
- absence of damage and defects;
- Smooth surface;
- uniform bright color;
- the presence of a weak crackle with light pressure.
To increase the germination of seeds, store peppers at the stage of maturity are purchased for collection. Selected specimens should be placed in a dry, warm place for 10-15 days. Exclude sunlight. The seeds can be removed when the skins of the vegetables wrinkle and become flabby.
Grain harvesting methods:
- shake out the pepper by making a longitudinal cut;
- cut the stalk along a circular path, carefully pull it out (the seeds will move away independently from the withered cup).
A period of additional drying is required when laying out the separated cup with seeds.
After harvesting, the grain must be dipped in a saline solution (10 g of seasoning for 500 ml of water). Next steps:
- After mixing the solution, some of the seeds will float up, they must be collected and discarded.
- Dry the grains that have sunk to the bottom. They can be laid out on a napkin or saucer, the seeds should lie under the sun for 2 weeks. Do not mix grains from peppers of different varieties.
- Thoroughly dried material should be placed in fabric bags or paper rolls.
To maintain germination, the seeds should be stored in a cool, dark place without moisture. The shelf life of planting material is 2-3 years, but experienced gardeners recommend using fresh grains. This rule can be followed when collecting material from both store-bought vegetables and from those grown by yourself.
Do you collect seeds from store peppers?
Original articleand many other materials, you can find on ourwebsite.
Read about growing pepper seedlings in the following article:How to grow strong pepper seedlings: step by step instructions