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Q: Hi Dave,
Last year I had a white, jalapeño-type chile growing in my garden, probably produced by cross pollination. I tried to germinate the seeds this year, from frozen pods I kept from last year. It did not work. So my first question is, does freezing affect the germination capacity of the seeds? My second question concerns the ‘Bulgarian Carrot’ chile, a very nice looking chile with a lot of bite! It seems that nobody agrees on the heat level of these. I read somewhere that they measured 50k SHU and somewhere else 300K. I surely would agree to this one but can you confirm please?
Thanks,
Gilles
A: Hello Gilles:
No, freezing should have no effect on germination. In fact, seeds are preserved this way to increase their longevity. What probably happened was that you froze immature fruit. I know of no testing of the ’Bulgarian Carrot’, but would suggest that 300k is way too high for a C. annuum like this one. Even 50k seems high to me—10 times hotter than a jalapeño.
–Dave
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