I have been reading some of the excellent articles on http://www.thechilliking.com and surprised by the technique of germinating chilli seeds in a wet paper towel in this article.
It seems all you need to do to germinate chilli seeds is get a damp paper towel, put the seeds on it, put another damp paper towel on top, seal it into a small plastic food bag and put it in a warm place.
My Birdseye chilli seeds planted on Sunday 27th February have yet to show their selves above the compost on the kitchen window sill (probably slowed down by the cold temperature at night). I know it is early days to expect to see any seedlings but it is disappointing when the Jalapeños came up so fast. So I tried this today seeing as I had a load of seeds that I extracted from the Birdseye chillies I used for my Chilli scrambled eggs on toast this morning (if you haven't tried this, I can highly recommend it). I have placed the bag in the airing cupboard (called the "hot press" in Northern Ireland) as it is likely to be significantly warmer in there than the rest of the house.
I am considering buying a heated propagator, I have been looking around and found one at B&Q for less than a tenner, so I may give that a punt.
Update:
ReplyDelete4 days later most of the little seeds showed a small white shoot, so I carefully put far too many of them in potting compost and put them on the now fairly crowded kitchen window sill.