Moving on from the tomatoey (Yes, of course it’s a word! I just invented it!) goodness of the first half of the week, today’s captivating comestible commentary gets a bit more spicy.
Whilst I was picking peppers and chiles I decided that I’d have another go at collecting seed from them. I’ve already tried it once this year and though it could be a little late in the season I may as well give it another try.
Tomatoes are easy to collect seed from as they tend not to cross-pollinate. Peppers and chiles are at the other end of the scale. They will self-pollinate, but they’ll also cross with any other Capsicum variety that so much as flashes its stamens at them. To get seed that will come true it’s therefore necessary to prevent that by introducing a peppery chastity belt ?
I bought a pack of mesh bags with ties that can be put over a group of flowers that are on the point of opening and pulled closed around the stem so prevent pollinating insects from getting to the flowers once they open.
I’ll remove the bags once the flowers have died off and loosely put a tie-wrap around the remaining stem to mark the fruit from which I want to save seeds.
There are of course still loads more tomatoes to come.
