Maybe try again with a little less water and also try a warm dark spot to germinate em. Maybe the light activated whatever bacteria or bad stuff that was in there?

Dont know for sure, just some suggestions.

Good luck
Jim

Josh

Some are square

12 cell and pots that peat or paper pots fit into.
With peat pots I peal off the peat before final transplant for better growth.

They sell 9 sell 9 cell incerts for the 72 cell tray at the 99 cent store too.
I don't get along with messing with the large 72 cell incert and if you cut it smaller it breaks up easily when you have to mess with it.
The incerts are thicker plastic.

Another thing about these that I learned is that they should not go into the soil, into which the plant/seedling is going to be planted into as it continues to rot/mold and I think can give the plant that nasty white mold on leaves illness. Is that a possibility or did my white mold come from somewhere else?

Rudy

I peel off the paper or peat pot before transplanting unless there are a ton of roots comming out through it.

I like paper ones because they degrade fast and I don't have to peel them off as often.

I put them in the small 2 inch pots in the pic.
I still peel it off unless it's some rare pepper I don't have more seeds for and don't want to risk loosing it by messing up the roots.
Plants are designed to grow no matter what.
Most times people love their plants to death.
I'm guilty of that as are a lot of other people.
The hardest thing to do is leave stuff alone and let it do it's thing,recover without help.
In general you end up with a stronger plant once it was left to deal with whatever was cauasing a problem in the first place.
Kind of sounds like you have a moisture problem to me.
I get some mold but it never spreads,stays on the pot not spreading to the soil.
The Peat ones have sawdust mixed in,I don't use them if I can get the Paper ones(no peat).
I can imagine a wood loving fungus spreading from the peat/wood ones.
Fungus is different than mold.
I don't really worry about mold,in general I can control it but fungus spores can live forever waiting for the right conditions.
From time to time I get flushes of Fugus in my pots.
I don't think the fungus itself messes with the plant.
The fungus seems to suck up water though so it can fruit,robbing the plant of water,not nutrients etc. or living off the plant itself.
Just my observations from using wood based soil mixes.
I don't like peat based ones.Too many critters love laying eggs in it and the babies like roots for dinner...

Thanks for your tips.
Rudy

(background)
my son came back from Iraq with a dream of growing super hots in my garden this summer. He will likely be transfered by the end of the year so I'm hoping for a good harvest he can bottle or dry and take with him to his new duty station. Through trades and gracious donors we have a nice selection of superhots. Now I just hafta get them germinated and growing :)

I read alot of your posts and respect your opinion (love your photos too!)
Thank you in advance.

After reading the link I checked all the baggies (didnt have much hope)

Seeds placed in baggies 3-3
now:
-3 serranos germinated
-all 6 white bullet habs germinated
-numerous other seeds look hopeful
-plenty that dont look close

*now is a good time to say that I said something wrong in a previous post. I believe I said that all our seeds might be considered 'super hots'. I didnt think about the serrano and anaheim. Obviously I knew close to nothing about peppers before my son asked me to grow these for him a few months ago. Most of what I've learned is from reading here :) Sorry for the mistake.

The other seeds I'm attempting to start are:
-bhut jolodia
-chocolate hab
-orange hab
-white bullet hab (he's hoping to make some white salsa so we also are going to grow white tomatoes
-caribbean red hab
-scotch bonnet-big sun
-fatalii
-chocolate bhut jolokia
-7 pod yellow
-7 pod jonah
-7 pod brain strain
-trinidad scorpion morouga blend
-trinidad scorpion yellow cardi

I only have 10 seeds of some of these types so I hate to risk loosing many due to my inexperience.

decisions....
should I get the little starter cups or just pull the seeds from the baggies and put them right into pots. Not sure which would be best ... hope you have some guidance

Thanks in advance.
greatly appreciate your help

It might have nothing to do with zips VS. cups.

It could be the way their conditions are as to which worked better fot the seeds they are germinating.

I now have a small setup for 4 inch pots. Hopefully between the 3 approaches, we'll have some success.

I did move one of the germinated white hab seeds into a pot. I believe I recall you mentioning at this point ~70 deg would be appropriate.

For some silly reason I couldnt bring myself to cover the little germinated seed with the potting mix. I'm not new to gardening, just to peppers (have only grown jal from purchased plants).

The commercial package said 1/4 inch deep. Sound right to you? At this point its just below surface level. I cut a tiny piece of the toweling so as not to disturb the roots. Looks happy so far.

Good grief, I sound like a first time mother!! haha

Thanks for hand-holding me :)
I really do appreciate all your time.

Good to know that you are from Southern Cal. I'm in Los Angeles, (Santa Monica area). Now that I read your posts I'll know that we should have the same weather and environment.

Nancy, I just wanted to wish you a huge success, and am hoping that all your peppers germinate, and also say Thank You, to you and your boy for serving.

Rudy

Rudy

With the help of a chopstick, they are now snug in their own private pots under a bit of potting mix.

I'm so pleased..21 in just 5 days :)

Of the 15 types of seeds, 7 have germination and 8 dont. Of the 8 I chose one that I have more seeds of and put 6 seeds into a little plastic cup with moist toweling on the bottom. We'll see how that goes.

Thanks for the well wishes Rudy, I'll tell my son. He isnt a kid (23 actually) that boasts but truely appreciates the kind words of people like you.
I found out today that his unit has orders for afganistan early next year. Not what a mother wants to hear. Who knows, maybe things will change. Thats a long time away.

When I was 19 I spent the summer near where you guys live. Had an apartment a couple blocks from the beach. Great memories :)

Smokemaster, what you said about the dirt helping the plant pull free from the shell makes sense.
Another question:
Once the little sprout is out of the soil, do you leave the lights on 24/7 or is it better to give them a few hours of dark each day?

The coffee filter has a much tighter weave and the seeds will remain on top.

Try to use a toothpick to remove the germinated seeds; someone above used a chopstick which seems a lot like a really big stick where a little one will have less potential for damage.

Good luck.

Andrew

I don't let the root grow very much.
Only reason I sprouted the seeds in zips was to see what seeds were germinated and to save room on my grow area.
Not have pots with seeds that weren't going to grow in them.

In general,if a seed doesn't germinate in 10-14 days it probably won't if conditions are right.
That can change with the variety of pepper and age of the seeds.
Nothing is written in stone except nature made plants and seeds want to grow if they are left alone. LOL

The chopstick worked great for planting. Thanks smokemaster
This morning one little plant appeared and a few others look close.

Andy, I understand what you're saying about the coffee filter but I didnt have any in the house (not a coffee drinker). I did what smokemaster said and just cut the toweling.

Of the seed types that have no germination yet...I put 3 seeds of each in little plastic contains with the damp toweling. Maybe I'll get better germ with this method.
seperating the eggs as you suggested smoke :)

Great thread. As for me, I usually only grow about 50-100 plants, so space is not much of an issue. I don't germinate, I just plant the seeds in Jiffy peat pellets and they've always done well - even the finicky ones. I find the number one thing is to give them heat.

Still to early for me to start peppers here in CT (5b). I'll start them on April 1. I'll sow peas outdoors next week.

50-100 sounds like a nice size pepper garden. I'm hoping for 5-8 plants of each of the 15 varieties. With all the good advice given here at least we have hope :)

Cleanliness improves germination results.