Do I need to soak pepper seeds before planting and how to do it correctly?

Most gardeners consider the pre-sowing preparation of seeds to be a mandatory procedure, and for good reason. If you know how to soak pepper seeds before planting, you can get friendly shoots much earlier than usual. The procedure can be carried out using various formulations, but it is not necessary to apply them all. It is enough to disinfect the seeds and use any of the stimulating solutions, after which the seed material is dried and sowed. It will be possible to get seedlings even faster if you first germinate the planting material.

Do pepper seeds need to be soaked before sowing?

Gardeners often argue among themselves about whether to soak vegetable seeds before planting. Several factors affect the yield of pepper at once, and one of them is the pre-sowing preparation of seeds.

• Residents of the southern regions can safely refuse to soak, in their weather conditions the pepper will have time to fully ripen and give a harvest.
• For summer residents living in the middle lane and a cold climatic zone, growing vegetables counts every day, so they should not neglect the opportunity to get earlier shoots.

Experienced gardeners believe that it is better to soak in any case. This procedure will not take much time and effort, but it will bring undoubted benefits.

Seeds of both sweet and hot peppers are subject to soaking:

• Seed material from the store undergoes the necessary preparation in production. Such seeds only need moisture to give them the opportunity to swell or germinate slightly.
• Your own seeds will need additional preparation before soaking. You need to calibrate them in saline solution and then decontaminate.

Before buying, you should take into account the fact that the planting material of this crop quickly loses quality, therefore it is better to take seeds collected in the previous season. Within a year, germination can be reduced by 50%.

When to soak pepper seeds according to the lunar calendar?

Pepper takes a long time to rise, so it is planted early - in February. For cold regions, where the planting of seedlings in open ground is postponed until warm weather, planting is carried out a little later - in early March.

It is worth noting that the moment the seeds are soaked is already considered the date of planting, since growth processes are immediately awakened in the seeds that have fallen into a moist environment.

Without exception, all summer residents are already familiar with the fact that there are favorable and unfavorable days for planting various crops according to the lunar calendar. Many adhere to the recommendations given there:

• Sowing vegetables that yield crops in the aboveground part should be carried out on the growing moon.
• New Moon and Full Moon are categorically not suitable for planting and sowing.
• In the waning moon phase, planting of root crops and bulbous crops is favorable.

Therefore, you can start soaking pepper seeds as soon as the crescent moon begins to grow. It is also advisable to consider whether a night star is in a fertile or infertile sign. The most fertile signs are Pisces, Taurus, Cancer and Scorpio.

In what solution is it better to soak pepper seeds?

If there are doubts about the quality of the planting material, the seeds are pre-calibrated in salt water:

1. A saline solution is prepared from 1 teaspoon of salt in a glass of water at room temperature.
2. The seeds are poured into salt water and wait 5-10 minutes.
3. High-quality seeds will settle to the bottom, empty ones will float on top - they are unsuitable for planting.
4. Complete planting material is washed in clean water and the following preparation stages are carried out.

Etching

Several types of disinfectants can be used for etching. Any of them will help to completely disinfect the seed material, relieving it of fungal spores, viruses and bacteria before sowing. It is better not to skip this important stage, the health of the grown plants depends on it in the future.

Soak the seeds in one of the following formulations:

• In potassium permanganate. The solution should be 1% strength. Processing is carried out within 20-30 minutes.
• In hydrogen peroxide. Prepare a solution of 3% concentration. So that the seeds do not die, they are left in the composition for no longer than 7 minutes.
• In boric acid solution. This will require 0.5 tsp. boric acid per 200 ml of water. Processing time is 2-3 hours.
• In Fitosporin solution. For cooking, you need settled or filtered water without chlorine. Dosage - 0.5 tsp of powder per liter of water. Soaking time is 1–2 hours.

After disinfection, the seeds must be washed.

If the seed coat has been damaged, after dressing, such material loses its germination, so only whole seeds are selected for the procedure.

Use of nutrient and stimulating solutions

You should start with the fact that you need to use melt, rain or spring water for soaking. The seeds are very sensitive to various impurities, so tap water is not suitable for these purposes. Boiling is also not an option: after it the water becomes "dead".

The highest biological activity is the moisture obtained during the thawing of ice or snow. Its beneficial qualities persist for 12 hours and then gradually diminish.

If the water was artificially frozen in the freezer, after thawing, use only that part of it that melted in the first place, since harmful impurities are concentrated in the center of the ice mass.

Soaking in melt water itself has a stimulating effect on the seeds. However, biological processes can be enhanced by preparing a solution based on growth stimulants or fertilizers.

Pepper seeds can be soaked in one of the following formulations:

• At the Zircon. The stimulating drug is based on echinacea. Its use significantly accelerates the seed germination time. The solution is prepared from 1 drop of the drug per 300 ml of water. The seeds must first be disinfected. Processing should take 16-18 hours.
• At Epin. The drug has an anti-stress effect, enhances the immunity of peppers. In the future, the plants are better able to withstand changes in temperature and humidity, and do not react so painfully to a lack of light. Before use, the drug is shaken until the precipitate disappears and 2 drops of the agent are added to 0.5 glass of water. The solution is poured over the treated seeds for 12-24 hours.
• In aloe juice. It is important to properly prepare the solution. For this, the lower leaves from an adult mature plant are used. Raw materials are washed, dried, placed in a plastic bag and refrigerated for 5–7 days for stimulating cells to mature. Then the leaves are crushed, squeezed out the juice through cheesecloth and diluted with water in a 1: 1 ratio. The processing time is 12-18 hours.
• In a solution of wood ash. For its preparation use 1 tsp. ash powder in a glass of water. The composition should be infused for 2 days. Then it is filtered and used to soak the seeds. Processing is carried out within 24 hours. Due to the content of important minerals, ash provides the seeds with an excellent start for growth before planting in seedlings.

Sowing preparation doesn't end there.After processing in growth stimulants, it is advisable to place the planting material for germination. In this case, it will be possible to plant knowingly high-quality pepper seeds, from which the roots have already hatched. The germination rate of such seedlings will be one hundred percent.

How many days are pepper seeds soaked?

The time for soaking pepper seeds before germination is always individual and depends on the characteristics of the solution used. For some formulations, the processing time is half a day or more.

The maximum duration of this procedure is 24 hours. Stimulants are used precisely for the purpose of quickly germinating planting material. And germination, in turn, significantly accelerates the emergence of seedlings in the soil.

How many soaked pepper seeds germinate?

After the preparatory procedures, they begin to germinate the pepper. The seeds are laid out in one layer on cheesecloth, placed in a deep saucer, filled with clean water, covering half, covered on top with another piece of wet gauze. You can use a shallow plastic container with a lid and ventilation holes for this purpose.

How many days it will take for sprouts to appear depends on the variety chosen.

Soaked seeds hatch from 7 to 15 days. All this time, the container should be warm. The optimum temperature for pepper germination is +24 ° C. The gauze on which the seeds lie should not dry out; this should be monitored. If the procedure is carried out in a plastic container, the cover should sometimes be removed briefly to ventilate.

Soaking pepper seeds is a simple procedure that does not require special skills and does not take much time. Using it before growing seedlings, you can get faster shoots and select the strongest shoots for planting. The use of stimulating solutions will increase the immunity of plants and have a positive effect on harvesting in the future.