So right at the end of January my wife bought me an Electric Propagator and I decided to run an experiment with it, plant some seeds in that and then plant some seeds just in a pot to see how it turned out, Twenty days later…
I’ve already reported back saying that the Electric Propagator had given me some seedlings after 7 days, so you already know that the chances are it’s going to be winning, but this is where we are up to as of today with the Electric Propagator…
If you don’t count the Paprika seeds I planted (which I don’t, I think the seeds where duds), then we’re looking at just over 60% germination, which while not brilliant, isn’t to bad either and far higher than the ones I planted naturally at the beginning of January.
Moving on over to my Pot of Many Seeds I used as a control…
So, five have popped up and nowhere near the height level of the Propagator, not counting the Paprika again, that’s a 56% rate of germination…
Not a right lot in it to be fair, the Propagator gave me more because I planted more, and they are much further along the path to Chillidom.
And, no, I don’t know what the random plant is at the bottom left, it’s not the Bhut Lah as that’s just popping up where it should be. Looks like I’ve another Mystery on my hands, good job I kind of like them!
All in all, on the back of this, I can see that Propagation is probably the way to go and definitely something to think about a bit harder for next year.
I think next year I’m going to throw some lights into the mix so that will make things even more interesting, I’ve seen friends pages on Facebook do amazing things when they’ve used lights (quite jealous of some of them!) so I think it’s just not all about a constant source of heat when you’re planting early.
I’ll be bringing more updates on these through the season, don’t think I’m done yet – I know which are which so we’ll be able to see which do better in the long run as well as the short term 🙂