Overwintering Hot Pepper Plants. Update. 11.20.22

 This "Early Jalapeño" plant didn't grow large in the garden, so I had left the leaves on it when I dug it up to overwinter.  Even though I had washed the roots pretty thoroughly, I noticed now it had aphids.

After spraying with the Dr Earth herbal spray, I reconsidered and cut off all of the leaves.  There are no peppers on this plant to ripen, so I probably should let it go dormant.

After trimming.

Before trimming.

Meanwhile, the plants I left leaves and peppers on, to ripen, still look pretty good.  No aphids, gnats, or whitefly that I can see.  The two larger plants are Thai Dragon and the smaller on is Tabasco.

It's still early, many months to go.  It's an interesting experiment.  It would be nice to get a jump start on peppers next year.  And also, potentially, more productivity from the overwintered plants.  

More Bulbs. 11.17.22

 Today I was at the hardware store, and saw these bulbs for half price.  So I bought them and planted them.

Overwintering Pepper Plants. Update. 11.17.22

 I check the pepper plants every two days.  They have indoors now for 3 to 4 weeks.  A few are in the sunroom, to ripen remaining peppers (Thai, Tabasco, a Serranno).  The others are in a 50s to 60s cool bright room.

I am moving the rest into the cool, bright room too.  I want them to be dormant.

Here are a Tabasco (left ) and Serrano (right)

They look about the same as when I transplanted them.  The stems are still green.  The peppers are about the same.  That's fine.  I want dormancy, not growth.

The Serrano had tiny fuzzy things on the soil.  I think they are whiteflies.  Not very active in the coolness.

I sprayed the plant and soil with this stuff.

Most of the fuzzy things disappeared immediately.  There were a few remaining, so I sprayed with some old Safer brand neem spray too.

Here are some of the other pepper plants.  Left to Right, Cayenne, Banana, Early Jalapeño.

The Cayenne is pushing a few buds.  So is the Banana.  Not much, but you can tell they are alive.  The stems are still green.  I didn't defoliate the Jalapeño.  It's mostly just sitting there, but the nodes are a little knobby, like some buds want to show.

Closeup of the Cayenne.

So far, so good.  They still have a long way to go.

Saving Cucumber Seeds. 11.17.22

 I kept a mature bush pickle cucumber fruit to save seeds.  It became very large.  To save seeds, the fruit needs to ripen and start to soften, and lose its green color,

While cleaning the garden, I also found a Chinese cucumber.  I didn't know it had any fruits.  The seed was from an old packet, and only one germinated.  These were in an out of the way location in the garden. I will save that seed too.

Both look the same when sliced open.  Despite being over-ripe, the insides had a fresh, pleasant, melon scent. 

The seeds get scooped out, along with some juice and loose flesh.  I place the mixture into a jar with some water, and allow it to ferment a few days.  The fermentation removes the seed casing.  Then they'll be rinsed and allowed to dry. 

Saving Eggplant and Tabasco Pepper Seeds. 11.12.22

 This eggplant was highly productive this year.  I was amazing.  So I saved seeds.

For eggplant, I didn't ferment.  I scooped out as many seeds as I could, and rinsed them off in a sieve with water.  Then I let them dry on a paper towel for a few days, then made a paper envelope to store them in.

I decided to save seeds from my Tabasco pepper plant as well.  This year my Tabascos were only minimally productive.  I'd like to grow enough to make Tabasco sauce.  I cut open a Tabasco pepper and removed the seeds.  They are drying in a bowl and will go into a paper envelope soon.