It's very late to start seeds, unless your zone permits. Few questions to help answer your question. How are you germinating, directly in ground or in pots? Indoor or outdoor germinating? Watering how often? Covered or uncovered? What temp are you germinating at?

I know it's kinda late to start them, but I figured I'd try anyway, I started some last year in mid June, and had excellent results & plentiful harvest thru the winter (indoors). This is my 2nd set of seeds this season, and I'm germinating this set in starter pots, outdoors, uncovered. It's hot (about 85-90° during day, low 70s overnite), but I keep the soil moist (not soaking wet), and the tray is not in direct sun, as my balcony is north facing and only gets early morning & late evening sun.

Sounds like you are doing everything right, the only two factors that I can see that would cause a problem is seeds, just have a unlucky batch that are duds, or the other is night time temps at 70 is low enough to delay sprouting. I would probably give them another week. You could while you are waiting another week, germinate another batch.

The seeds I started are all from my own peppers from last year, except the Peters & Reapers. I don't understand how such a variety of seeds could all be duds.... I planted 36 total, of 6 different types, and only one has emerged (I suspect it's a bell, not 100% sure)! I have plenty more seeds from my batches, but used all my Reaper & Peter pepper seeds, so if these don't come up, then I guess I'll have to wait til next season when I order more :(

Finally another sprout is popping up, and there seems to be slight soil disturbance in a few other starter cells, so fingers crossed!! Still can't remember what went where, but again I know it's definitely not a reaper (I labeled those & forgot to do the rest )

On the plus side, my 1st batch of Reapers is doing well, and working on their 3rd & 4th true sets of leaves since I separated them & put them in pots! So are my volunteer BP plants that I potted individually. Some are bigger than others, all 7 survived being transplanted, but one has deformed cotyledons, so I may cull it.... kinda want to wait & see what happens

That's good, glad you have seeds starting to emerge, it's better than a complete loss. Volunteer plants are always a nice treat and BP are great looking plants! Keep us updated and post pics when you can.

Absolutely! I love the BPs myself... They're a conversation piece for sure. Most of my BP plants from last season surVived the winter and are already producing plenty of pods, some are ripe already. Current count on BP is 8 mature plants & 6 healthy seedlings. My 1 Thai Dragon from last season is also producing some nice pods, and one is starting to turn as of yesterday. Can't wait for my reapers to start producing tho... They're the ones I'm really exited about this year. So far the leaves are the right size, color & shape to be true reapers (unlike last year's "reapers" that turned out to be Thai Dragons & that "mystery" hybrid Hab!!

***UPDATE***

One more sprout this morning, making 3 out of 36 started. There's 18 cells per tray divided into sections of 6, and they're all in different sections, so I know for sure its 3 different varieties (but again not reaper ) There are a few cells still showing slight soil disturbance, so I can't wait to see what tomorrow morning has in store for me!! I'll keep ya'll posted!

*** Update ***

So it appears that one of my seedlings is definitely either one of my yet-to-be-ID'd Hab hybrid from last season, or my own experiment of crossing that same hybrid w/ BP!! (I didn't start pure BP this time, as I already have 6 "volunteer" seedlings) This little guy looks great at 3 days old, and the main stalk is beginning to take on a slight purplish color (same thing my Hab hybrid did last yr), so it will be interesting to see which one it turns out to be! No new sprouts this morning, but I'm sure bringing the tray indoors (AC set to 68° ) to protect the existing seedlings from severe weather last night is the culprit. They're back outside now, and the temp is low 80s, with a forecast high of 89°. I hope to see new sprouts either later today, or tomorrow morning

That's good, I think you have a good chance that over the next week many more will pop up. The cross/hybrid sounds like a cool looking plant. I bet the pods will look cool, time will tell. I know it's going to be a while before pods appear but please remember to post pics.

I sure will! I know my original Hab hybrid that is one of the parent plants had kind of burgundy-purple streaks thru the main stalk & branches, and dark green leaves, w/ white flowers fringed in purple. It was very pretty indeed. If you remember from last season, I was never able to identify the exact cross & referred to it as my "Mystery" plant. Unfortunately it didn't survive the winter indoors, but I started about 10 seeds I saved in this batch, so hopefully I get atleast one or two babies from it! I'm anxious to see what this little seedling does & how it grows. It's definitely more purple than the Hab hybrid started out, but still shows green as well

***UPDATE***

Still the same 3 sprouts in 2nd batch... no new ones yet, but these 3 are starting to get their 1st true leaves. As for my 1st batch, I just potted-up the largest of my 3 reapers to a 3gal container, and separated the other two into their 1st actual pots (6" ceramic) to give them a little more growing room. They seem stunted compared to my larger one, but doing well. Hopefully they will take off now that they are in their own space!

Of my volunteer BPs, I have 5 that are doing well, but one doesn't seem to be doing much of anything, so I may cull yet another one. That's ok tho... The same plant that spawned these now has 6 more babies in its container, which I find amusing since I just potted up all my plants about 2 weeks ago & thought I had prevented more from popping up... Oops! I'm running out of small pots (and space), so I may just keep 1 or 2, and pull the rest, still debating. I honestly have enough BPs already... 8 of which are happily producing!

***UPDATE***

Yay!! 3 sprouts have become 5! (Still not my 2nd set of Reapers ), but I refuse to lose hope!! The original 3 have their 1st true leaves now & have really started to take off!

I now have 8 volunteer BPs, after giving 3 more to my friend's twins. I think I started a "gardening bug" in my apartment complex, because my friend now has 8 pepper plants & an unidentifiable house plant growing, the lady below me has planted something that looks a bit like flowers (not sure...still very immature plants) & a small tree, and the lady across from me suddenly has what looks to be peppers on her balcony! They're have been others suddenly putting plants on their balconies too, but they didn't take care of them & they died off.

At last count, I have 33 plants on my balcony, 17 of which are babies. My Thai Dragon, Mammoth Jalapeño, BPs & regular jalapeño are already setting pods, and my Tobasco looks like it's starting to set flowers. Overall, I think I'm off to the start of a great harvest season!! My 3 reapers have taken off since I transplanted them, and they're the ones I'm most anxious about, lol. I'll keep y'all posted!!

seems like you have a bad case of the chile bug

At this point I still only have 7 plants from this batch of seeds. The other 29 have never sprouted. Should I leave the trays alone & see what happens? Or do I just give up on the remaining seeds & toss 'em?

If they were wild varieties I would say let them be, but of the varieties you have, I think it's been long enough that you probably won't be seeing any more sprout. Can you post a pic of how your current plants are doing?

@ habjolokia.... Here are my current seedlings.

1st batch of Carolina Reaper (largest pot, blue pot & bottom left starter pot in black tray), and 7 of my volunteer Black Pearls.

2nd batch is mixed seeds (the ones in question, LOL)... 2 Reaper (the 2 cells by white tag, definitely never germinated), and like a dummy I forgot to label the rest.... So, these could be Bells, Peters, mystery Hab-hybrid, Hab-hybrid/BP cross, and Habs (MS cog fog!! can't remember how I seeded the cells, so guess we'll find out later!)

*** UPDATE***

I just re-potted my 3 oldest seedlings from 2nd batch, and figure the remaining 4 will be ready to move from their cells sometime next week. I'm really anxious to see if the 2 with the purplish tint to their stems are the hybrid Hab I had last year, or if it's the new hybrid I tried creating w/ that same Hab hybrid & black pearls. I know that my new cross will be unstable, but if it turns out that is what's growing, I'm excited!! Either way I'll be happy, because even not knowing exactly what strain of Hab hybrid the parent plant was, the peppers were very tasty indeed! They definitely had the Hab heat, but bursting with flavor as well (to me, regular Habs pack a punch but lack robust flavor). My 1st batch (3 reapers) is doing great, and each plant has between 4-8 sets of true leaves, and stands between 3-6" tall already. My volunteer black pearls are doing fairly well too... Even though I transplanted them at the cotyledon stage, lol. I've decided that I have enough Black Pearl plants (16), so if any more pop up, I'm just gonna pull them like weeds. I will also be giving some away, because I just do not have the space on my balcony for so many plants!!

All your plants look great! I hope you get a tasty cross and while it might not be stable now, if you like the flavor you can grow it out over the next few years and it can become stable. What ever the cross it please post the resulting pods, I like to see how crossed pods look. Do you plan on using the reaper pods and if so how do you plan on using them? I can handle Ghost hot sauce but Reaper sauce is a bit much.

Thanks!! I definitely will post pics of the crossed pods, but I still don't know if it's the mystery Hab cross from my plant last season, or if these 2 are my own experimental cross, because they look so similar to the original plant as it grew, with just a slight variation in color. I do wish that plant had survived overwintering, lol!

As for the reapers, I do plan to atleast try one, and see if I can handle the heat. If so, I'll use them the same as I do my other peppers... To cook with, and make sauces.

Pepper Palace has a sauce called Flashbang, which is made with Bhut, Reaper, Moruga Scorpion and a couple other super hots (Naga & 7 pot I think), and I was able to handle the taste challenge they offer, so maybe I will be able to with my pods. Who knows :P

If I can't, I do have a few friends eager to try them! My kids' dad is one of those... he eats Habs, Bhuts, and Thai dragons like they're candy, so it'll be interesting to see if he can handle a reaper or not... He's really anxious to eat one. When my 4yr old was a baby, I couldn't figure out where all my Hab & Bhut pods kept disappearing off my plants to... Until one day I caught him sneaking a couple every time he walked past them!! I love cooking with those, so I was a bit annoyed, but amused at the same time.... He showed no visible sign that he'd just eaten them!! In fact, he claims that there is no pepper in existence that is too hot for him, we shall see! ;-)