Hubby picked first of his 'John's Sin Nombre'green chile last week .... & hot as ever. The plants are 3 ft. tall already. Some of the jalapeños are 6 inches long ... he keeps the seed each year (they were originally 'Biker Billy' jals) so some may have crossed with the 'Sin Nombre'.. though they are 50 ft. away in another garden. The Bhut are slow as ever but recent heat wave here with some needed showers may kick them awake! They too were grown x seed x NM State University & planted in the ground in their garden space May 20. The gardens (two 12 x 20 ft.) have been amended with lots of sand that has volcanic sand, rocks broken up in it x our son's westside of the City home located under the volcanic escarpment & that sand sure seems to give our caliche/clay soil on our eastside of the City a boost!We also toss bags & bags of leaves & kitchen waste into the soil too but darn potato peelings grow & have taken over most of the vegetable garden ... but we sure get a good crop of nice size 'taters x them in the fall! Crazy how the 'garbage' grows when composted into the garden!

Do most of you Bhut growers grow the plants in containers farther north of our USDA zone 7 ( Bhut also grows in colder zone 6 in Roswell, NM which is farther south & lower altitude than us.) or directly into the garden? Was wondering what the coldest zone that they can be planted in the ground outdoors & then develop? The seed takes forever to germinate!

Waiting to see how the 'new & improved' 'Big Jim' seed x NMSU will do this year ... supposed to have more consistant heat on each plant & thicker skins for relleños.