What have you done in the garden today?

Haha - let's hope the seed doesn't produce prematurely aged broccoli!! Not a pleasant thought...

Chilli-head wrote: I turned on the electric propagator to warm up ready, and put some of the elderly brassica seeds from the seed swap in there on a bit of damp kitchen towel as a germination test.  

The Red Cabbage Kalibos, sow by 2011, are about 50% chitted so far. Good enough to use - I can sow them a pinch to each module and thin to the best seedling.

No signs of life from purple broccoli (2005) or pak choi (2012) as yet.

Interesting - keep us posted on that CH if you've got time.

Probably about 90% of the red cabbage now have chitted. The odd one of the pak choi too.

Hooray, I finally got my new rhubarb crown in. It's been sitting in a bucket in the shed for a fortnight.

All I've done today in the garden is to walk quickly through it shivering!!

I didn't even make it out into the garden.   But I did spend some time rummaging through my seed collection.  Each year the same dilemma;  which chillies to grow this year.   I always want to grow lots, but know that I don't have space ! So settled on:

Ecuadorian devil's breath  
Ohnivec
Anaheim
Mulato
Ancho
Bolivian rainbow
Pasilla
Early Jalapeno

The jalapenos and pasillas will be for smoking.

Which do you expect to be the hottest out of that collection - is it the first by any chance???

The jalapenos and pasillas will be for smoking.

You do mean smoking as in ending up with smoked chillies don't you & not putting in a pipe or roll ups?

We're still frozen solid here, minus 5 this morning, so nothing doing in the garden but the snowdrops are looking great (from the window).

I meant the former, like so.  The thought of putting chillies in a roll up is frightening - the chocking fumes when toasting dried chillies for cooking is bad enough !

The Ecuadorian Devils breath is a capsicum chinense  type, which are always hot, but is a mild one by that standard.   Pepperchronicles on YouTube tastes them raw and gives his comments here.  It's a fun channel to watch,  you can tell by his reaction what is really hot.  His reaction to Chocolate Bhut Jolokia looks like it is a struggle even for him. I have grown the very similar Chocolate Dorset Naga, and would not be brave enough to taste a whole one raw ...

I really liked the sound of the peach pepper jam. Chinense chillies have a lovely fruity flavour which would work really well. I liked his equipment list beginning with safety glasses and rubber gloves

Chilli-head wrote:

Chilli-head wrote: I turned on the electric propagator to warm up ready, and put some of the elderly brassica seeds from the seed swap in there on a bit of damp kitchen towel as a germination test.  

The Red Cabbage Kalibos, sow by 2011, are about 50% chitted so far. Good enough to use - I can sow them a pinch to each module and thin to the best seedling.

Just to finish the story - after 7 days the sow by 2012 red cabbage and pak choi both gave a good emergence, but the 2005 broccoli just went mouldy.

So although stretching the dates quite a bit past both the packet recommendation and the viability charts I posted earlier, there definitely are limits !

sowing some more sweet peas perfume delight and galaxy the most underated flower lovely perfume/scent if you get the right variety

well we sowed more chilis,broad beans in pots ,lots of muck spreading up allotment katie weeded the two rows of spring cabbage and flattened mole hills we helped to put a shed up with an allotment neighbour and loads of other stuff over the last couple of weeks too much to mention what about you ?

Hi Gunners. If it seems a bit quiet here, it's because I'm trying out a new monthly thread for gardening here. The idea is that it might be easier to refer back to as a monthly record, a bit like a garden diary sort of thing.

I've planted a few more raspberries by moving some of the canes that came up where they weren't supposed to be, planted out some of my strawberry runners, and took some blackcurrant cuttings. Anxiously waiting for chillies to emerge in the greenhouse.