How to collect bell pepper seeds

Despite the abundance of varieties and hybrids of pepper seeds in stores, many gardeners prefer to prepare their own seed material. The point here is not only about saving money (although it is significant), but also about the fact that stronger plants, adapted to specific conditions, are obtained from your own seeds.
Their productivity is, as a rule, higher, and diseases affect them less.

But when receiving seeds, it is necessary to take into account some nuances:

features of agricultural technology;
insulation of various grades.

Without following certain rules, you cannot obtain high-quality seed material. Therefore, our article will focus on how to properly harvest pepper seeds.

Which pepper is suitable for obtaining seeds?

Suitable seed material is obtained only from fruits that meet the following criteria:

Only varietal types of pepper are suitable for seed collection. Hybrids marked F1 on the packaging are not suitable for obtaining planting material. Hybrids do not retain parental qualities, therefore, from such seeds anything will grow, but not the variety from which the seeds were taken;
The peppers needed to obtain seeds must be well ripened. Seeds are taken only from fruits of uniform ripeness, and it is desirable that they ripen on the bush;
To obtain planting material, you should select strong, healthy fruits, regular shape and uniform color. You should not take seeds from fruits that have spots of various types and deformations;
It is advisable to pick the seed peppers from the three lower branches. This is explained by the fact that flowers appear on such branches early and are less likely to be pollinated by other varieties.

It is important to exclude the possibility of pollination of the selected variety by other plant species. Pepper is a self-pollinating plant, but there are often cases when pollen from other varieties gets on the flowers. When bitter and sweet peppers are cross-pollinated, the resulting fruits taste bitter.

To avoid getting a bitter hybrid, sweet and bitter varieties of pepper should be planted away from each other. It is advisable to plant some tall crops between them.

Rules for choosing fruits for seeds

Having chosen the “favorites” from the plants, they then begin to select the fruits from which the seeds will be taken. And here you also need to take into account some recommendations.

It is clear that the best seeds will be in beautiful and healthy fruits. So select them, taking into account that they should grow on shoots of the first or second level. Typically, these fruits are the largest in peppers, and they are the very first to reach technical maturity.

They must show all the signs of the “breed”:

appropriate weight;
form;
dimensions;
skin color.

There should be no damage to the pepper (dents, cracks, chips).

ON A NOTE! It is believed that fruits from the first and second levels are best suited for obtaining seeds. Seeds from fruits that form later have low germination and lower yield.

As you know, pepper fruits can be picked for food already in a state of technical maturity. When does it come? The fruits reach the weight and size of full-fledged fruits, but their color still remains green. These peppers are already suitable for eating, but they cannot be used for collecting seeds.

Seeds are collected only from fruits at the stage of biological ripeness, that is, when they change the color of the skin from green to yellow, red, pink, orange. This is an indication that the peppers are fully ripe.

Experienced gardeners usually pick peppers green and place them to ripen indoors. By doing this, they stimulate the formation and ripening of subsequent fruits, which increases the overall yield. But when collecting your seeds from those bushes that are selected, the fruits of the first and second levels are not removed. They are left to ripen until the end, until the fruits acquire a characteristic color for the variety, and when pressure is applied to the walls of the pepper, a slight cracking appears.

IMPORTANT! The fruit that is selected for seeding should take an average of about 35-40 days to form.

This is the time from the moment the fruit is formed until its full ripening. In order not to accidentally cut off the fruit intended for collecting seeds, it is recommended to tie ribbons or strings to the branches.

Opinions vary regarding the ripening of peppers on the plant and their harvesting for seeds. It is believed that peppers should be allowed to ripen on the bush (as far as the weather allows), then the seeds will have good immunity and retain their qualities for a long period. At the same time, the material that will be taken from peppers that reached biological ripeness indoors will also be good, but it will lose germination rates faster. Typically, gardeners do not store seeds for a long time; for sowing in the spring, they use material collected in the summer of the previous season.

Which fruits to choose

Pepper seeds need to be marked in advance. Experienced gardeners take fruits from well-formed bushes with a lot of ovary. Peppers with well-defined characteristics of the variety are left on the seed material. It should be fleshy, large and regular in shape.

To be on the safe side, you need to take 2-3 fruits from each variety. Suitable specimens are marked at the maturation stage. In order not to accidentally pick such a pepper, a bright rope is tied to it.

The fruits are picked for seeds after they are fully ripe. The color of such peppers should be bright and even. The flesh of a ripe pepper is fleshy and soft. When you squeeze a ripe fruit with your hand, a faint cracking sound is heard, which also indicates ripeness.

Peppers are harvested for seeds from mid-August to the first days of September. After this, the fruits are kept in a warm room for a couple of weeks until they become dried in appearance.

How to choose the right plant

The next step is to select the plants from whose fruits the seeds will be harvested. What to pay attention to:

Pepper bushes should be strong and healthy.
To harvest seeds, you need to select two or three bushes and take fruits from each. This will be a kind of safety net in case some plant suddenly gets sick.
The best time to select bushes is mid-summer, when the development of the plant, the speed of formation, and the quality of the fruit are already visible.
It is necessary to select bushes with beautiful, large fruits that will most closely match the specific variety in size and color.

Peppers must be uniform in size and have a shape characteristic of the given variety. So, if the description of the variety indicates cone-shaped red fruits up to 12-14 cm long, then the bush should have just such peppers.

What to prepare for seed collection

Collecting bell pepper seeds at home is easy. Even a novice summer resident can cope with this task. To harvest seed material, no special tools or equipment are required. You need to prepare:

sharp knife;
white paper;
a plate for collecting and drying seeds;
paper storage bags or linen bags;
a felt-tip pen or marker to label the planting material, and several small sheets of paper.

In addition, you should take a bowl to collect the pepper halves and stalks.

After collecting the seed material, the pepper pulp can be used for cooking or freezing.

Is it possible to collect seeds from peppers bought in a store?

Pere

Not every pepper can be used for preparing seed material. Many summer residents grow bell or bitter peppers from seeds purchased at gardening stores. Most often, such fruits are not suitable for collecting seeds.

In most cases, pepper hybrids are available in stores. They are very popular among vegetable growers due to their high resistance to pests and diseases, ease of care and excellent yield. But hybrids are grown only from new planting material.

Despite the fact that the fruits of hybrid peppers ripen similarly to varietal ones and also contain seeds, they are not used for growing vegetables.

Such material germinates very poorly and even in the case of germination does not retain its parental properties. That is why, to obtain seeds, it is best to use the fruits of proven varieties grown in your own garden or in a greenhouse.

How to collect seeds

Not all gardeners know how to collect sweet pepper seeds correctly, which is why the germination of planting material deteriorates. Pepper seeds are collected in several successive stages.

The table is covered with white paper; it is on white that the spilled seeds are clearly visible and are easy to collect.
Cut the pepper in half lengthwise and carefully remove the stem into a plate. Alternatively, you can carefully cut the stem around and pull it out by the tail. After this, knock on the pepper with a knife so that the remaining seeds fall out.
In dried peppers, the seeds separate more easily. It is enough to cut the fruit crosswise and tap it a little with your fingers.
Write the variety of the crop on a piece of paper and place it in a flat plate, then pour the seeds there.
The plate is placed on the window and kept there for a week. Stir the seeds periodically so that they dry evenly.

Seeds from only one type of pepper are poured onto one plate. Each variety must be labeled to avoid confusion in the beds later.

You can dry bell pepper seeds on paper, but do not forget to label the variety.

How to collect seeds correctly

Collecting seed material from bell or hot peppers follows one simple scheme that does not cause difficulties even for a novice vegetable grower.

Proper seed collection:

Cut the finally ripe peppers from the bush - they should have the size, shape and color characteristic of a particular variety.
To check ripeness, lightly press the surface of the vegetable with your fingers - it should be soft, but have an elastic “crackle”.
The collected fruits need further ripening. To do this, move the pepper to a dry and warm place, spread it on a flat surface in a thin, even layer and leave it for 6-8 days away from direct sunlight. At elevated air temperatures in the room, ripening will take no more than 3-4 days.
To determine readiness, inspect the fruits - their peel should become soft and wrinkled.
Make a cut around the perimeter of the stalk and remove the seeds onto a plate with your fingers or a sharp knife blade.
Rinse the seeds under running water, clearing them of vegetable pulp, and dry on a sheet of paper.
Many gardeners advise drying the seeds directly on the stalks without removing them. To do this, leave the saucer with the stalks in a warm and dry place, and after drying them, remove the dry seeds.

The principle of harvesting seeds from hot pepper is practically no different. Collect fully ripe large and fleshy fruits of bright, rich color from the bushes, removing them along with the stalk.

Dry and lightly wilt the harvested vegetables in a warm, dry room, away from direct sunlight. After this, cut each fruit in half and carefully remove the seeds, being careful not to lean too low into the pepper. Rinse the seeds under running water and dry thoroughly in fresh air.

General recommendations

To obtain seed material with good germination, you must follow a number of recommendations.

After separating the seeds from the stalk, it is recommended to dip them into a solution prepared from a teaspoon of salt and half a liter of water and mix well. Floating seeds are not suitable for planting; they are immediately thrown away, and the rest are dried;
Bell pepper seeds should be dried in the sun. Thanks to the sun's rays, the seed material is disinfected;
Experienced gardeners recommend dipping the seeds for 15 minutes in a solution of potassium permanganate before drying.
Only completely dry seeds can be stored. Otherwise, they will lock up and be unsuitable for planting.

It is recommended to collect seeds from bell peppers that are closest to the stalk. It is believed that such a seed receives the best nutrition and therefore has good germination.

Storage recommendations

Sowing hot and bell peppers in the garden is usually done in the spring. Seeds collected this season must be properly stored so that after several months they do not lose their viability.

After drying at room temperature, the grains are distributed into paper bags or fabric bags. On each of them they sign the name of the species and variety, the date of collection, and if desired, you can also indicate the main characteristics of the fruit - size, color, weight and ripening time.

Advice! It is not recommended to store pepper seeds in plastic bags or plastic containers. Planting material in such packaging will not be able to breathe and will be protected from moisture.

Pepper seeds must be kept in a darkened room with low air humidity at a temperature of 10 to 25 ° C. If the basic conditions are met, the grains remain viable for 3-4 years.

How to store seeds

It is recommended to store bell pepper seeds in paper envelopes or cotton bags. It is unacceptable to store planting material in glass jars and plastic bags, as there is a high probability that the seed will be blocked.

Seed material must be stored in a dry, cool place, away from direct sunlight. It is optimal to store dried and packaged seeds on a veranda or loggia, where the temperature does not exceed 10 degrees Celsius.

The date on which they were collected is written on each bag of seeds. Every year the bags are sorted out and unsuitable seeds are thrown out. Experienced summer residents advise wrapping each bag in a piece of foil. This protects the planting material from moisture and premature growth.

Seed storage

After such painstaking work, one thing remains - to properly save the seeds until next year, until sowing time. To do this, first prepare paper bags or envelopes in which seeds are placed according to variety.

Next, place the peppers in a cool, dry, dark place. Avoid exposing the bags to sunlight, as well as storing seeds in conditions of high humidity. Low temperatures are also harmful to peppers.

IMPORTANT! Don't forget to label and sign the packages. The varieties must be precisely distributed to make it easier to deal with sowing dates in the spring.

Obtaining hot pepper seeds is no different from sweet peppers. But when working with it, you must use bandages or even respirators, do not touch your face with your hands, and after work, be sure to thoroughly wash your hands twice. Failure to follow these rules will lead to very unpleasant consequences: burning of the skin, burns.

Peppers can be stored for up to three years, but we must remember that one-year-old seed material has the best germination.

How to prepare seeds for planting

To get a good harvest of bell peppers, you need to properly prepare the seed material for planting. To do this, first the seed is sorted, removing spoiled and blackened specimens. After that, the good seeds are poured into a piece of gauze, placed on a saucer and filled with a weak solution of potassium permanganate. This helps to disinfect planting material.

Hot water helps activate life processes in seeds. Planting material is immersed in water for 2 minutes, the temperature of which is 50-60 degrees. Hotter water will cause the seeds to not sprout at all.

To speed up the germination of seeds, they are left for two days in gauze moistened with water. Thanks to this simple manipulation, the seedlings sprout faster.

Collecting bell pepper seeds is easy. Even novice gardeners and summer residents can do this. Self-collection of planting material allows you to grow exactly the variety of sweet pepper that you need.

Preparing to collect seeds

Preparation for collecting seed material depends on what kind of pepper the seeds will be harvested from - bell or bitter.

For sweet peppers you will need:

a sheet of cardboard or thick paper;
scissors or a knife with a sharp blade;
saucer or flat plate;
marker or felt-tip pen to label the seeds.

To collect seeds from hot peppers, you will also need thick protective gloves. The hot fruit contains capsaicin – it is this substance that gives peppers their characteristic pungency. If it comes into contact with the skin, it causes burning and irritation.

It is advisable to cover your eyes with safety glasses to prevent juice from entering. If drops of a burning substance get on the skin or mucous membranes, immediately wipe these areas with gauze or a cotton sponge soaked in sunflower oil. This will prevent redness from occurring.

What else will you need for the procedure?

For the procedure to be quick and successful, it is enough to arm yourself with: a flat plate for collecting and drying seeds, a sharp knife, paper, a marker, paper envelopes or bags for storing material.

In addition, you need to prepare a bowl for collecting the stalks and halves of the pepper.

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We collect seeds from our peppers and tomatoes. Collecting seeds step by step, with tips

Good afternoon, dear friends, gardeners and gardeners! I welcome you to our “Country Stories” community.

Part 1. Your own tomato seeds.

Tomatoes are a crop that is loved by breeders from all over the world. The number of tomato varieties and hybrids registered in the State Register is more than three thousand, but every year new ones appear that have not yet been certified. Let's add to this varieties of amateur selection, which are often not inferior in properties to varieties from well-known seed companies. But there are also varieties and hybrids of foreign selection!

Curiosity is in the blood of gardeners. It’s so interesting to see a new plant, to admire its unusual flowers or beautiful fruits: their size, shape, color, taste. Therefore, every year we sow new varieties from those that we especially liked based on the description or reviews of gardeners. However, we also have our own favorites, which we grow from year to year.

Climatic conditions and the nature of the soil vary so much in different regions that no one can say “this variety of tomatoes is the best!” In some conditions it will perform excellently, and in others it will perform rather mediocre. So each summer resident has his own “favorites”.

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Varieties or hybrids?

Of course, only varieties are suitable for seed production. Sometimes you like some hybrid so much that you want to grow it again in your greenhouse, and to do this, collect your own seeds. But you stop yourself. You should not take seeds from hybrids. There will be a harvest, of course, but no one knows what kind. But you don’t want to plant a “dark horse” in a greenhouse that will simply take up space.

F1 hybrids are obtained by crossing different varieties. If you grow new plants from their seeds, splitting into the properties of “father” and “mother” will occur. In this case, it is not their strengths that may appear, but their shortcomings. But if you really really want it, you can take a risk. The main thing to remember is that especially often second-generation hybrids, when splitting, lose resistance to diseases, but you may not notice changes in the shape or taste of the fruit at all.

With varieties everything is simpler and clearer. They are who they are. And they carry their qualities unchanged from year to year. Therefore, if you are lucky enough to find a tomato variety that has performed excellently in your area, in your greenhouse or in open ground, be sure to take seeds from it.

Your own or purchased?

The germination rate of your own seeds is much higher than that of purchased ones. They are a priori fresh, not overdried. If you collect them carefully, then mis-grading is excluded. Tomato seeds remain viable for 4-5 years, so at one time you can provide yourself with seeds for several years to come.

How many seeds you need depends on your farm. If you have a small greenhouse, then one tomato will provide enough seeds for several years. If you grow tomatoes for sale or sell seedlings, the volumes here are completely different. Collecting your own seeds in this case significantly reduces the cost of production.

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How to collect your seeds?

Don't pick ahead of time.

The main difficulty when collecting seeds is keeping them on the bush until they are fully ripe. To be sure that the seeds are ripe, the fruit must hang on the branch until its biological ripeness. If there are several gardeners in the family, you have to put some symbols on the selected fruit so that your “colleagues” do not pick it and send it to salad or adjika.

Do not rot during ripening.

When the tomato is completely ripe, remove it and leave it to ripen in the window for a few more days, up to a week. It is important here not to forget about it and not allow it to begin to rot. The tomato should soften, its skin may wrinkle, but it should not begin to rot. It is better to leave whole tomatoes, without cracks, for the seeds, since various pathogenic microorganisms penetrate through the cracks and mold appears. The seeds of such fruits will carry pathogens, but we don’t need that.

Select the seeds.

Cut the finished tomato crosswise. This opens the seed chambers to the eye, and it is convenient to remove the seeds with a teaspoon or the tip of a knife. Tomato seeds are surrounded by mucus, which is inseparable from them. In principle, you don’t have to separate it, but simply dry the seeds on a piece of newspaper. This will not affect germination.

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Separate the seeds from the mucus and pulp.

But if you want to get pure seeds “like in the store,” then you need to let the pulp ferment. To do this, place the seeds along with the mucus in a jar, fill it with a small amount of water, cover it with a lid to prevent any microbes from flying in, and leave it on the windowsill. Shake the jar daily to speed up the process of separating the seeds from the pulp.

In three or four days you will see that the seeds have settled to the bottom - which means it’s time to get them out. Carefully drain the fermented liquid from the pulp; the seeds will remain at the bottom. You can rinse them with water several times and place them in a strainer.

Dry in the dark.

It is better to dry the seeds on ordinary newspaper. It will absorb excess moisture; stuck seeds can be separated from a smooth newspaper more easily than from a soft napkin. To help the seeds dry better, spread them on newspaper. After a day or two, begin to separate them, rubbing them between your fingers, so the seeds will become loose.

It is better to dry the seeds in the dark. Find a place where they will not be blown away by the wind or thrown off by pets. Don't forget to sign the name of the variety. This can be done directly on the newspaper. It is better to store ready-made seeds in a regular paper package; seeds can become moldy in a plastic bag.

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For those who need a Lot of Seeds

If you need a lot of tomato seeds of the same variety, and you don’t want to bother with each tomato, you can pass them through a meat grinder, and then do the same with them - pour the pulp with water, leave to ferment, rinse and dry the seeds.

Part 2. How to collect and obtain pepper seeds with good germination?

A good harvest of sweet peppers pleases the gardener's eye. All the effort in growing seedlings and caring for plants has finally paid off. In the southern regions, sweet peppers grow well in open ground; in the middle zone and more northern regions, an excellent harvest can only be obtained in a greenhouse.

The variety of pepper varieties is so great that every time you want to try growing a new variety. However, clear favorites emerge from time to time. After all, the yield of pepper is influenced not only by its varietal characteristics, but also by the actual growing conditions. The same variety can manifest itself differently in different regions.

If this year you are overwhelmed with pepper harvest, then you will involuntarily want to leave this variety for seeds. And really, why buy seeds if you can collect your own?! Your own seeds have better germination than purchased ones, of course, if they are collected correctly.

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Rules for collecting pepper seeds

Harvesting fruits at biological ripeness.

In order to be sure that the seeds are fully ripe, the seed fruit must hang on the bush until it reaches its biological ripeness and acquires the color characteristic of the fruit: red, orange or yellow.

Since pepper has a fairly long growing season, it is better to leave the fruit from the lower tier for seeds, since it will definitely have time to ripen during our short summer. Fruits collected at technical ripeness should not be left green for seeds, because... there is a high probability that the seeds in them have not ripened.

Selection of fruits from the best bush.

Despite the fact that all plants of the same variety have the same genes, some specimens still develop better, and some worse. Of course, it is better to use fruit from a well-developed plant that has shown good yield and disease resistance for seeds.

Short ripening.

After the seed fruit is picked from the bush, you need to leave it to ripen in room conditions for 4-5 days. During this time, the skin of the pepper will wrinkle a little; there is no need to bring it to a state where the juicy walls become too soft, or worse, begin to rot. Ripening for too long is harmful to pepper seeds, because... they they can go into a state of rest.

This problem occurs especially often with hot pepper seeds. Hot peppers are usually dried whole, and the gardener thinks about taking seeds from them closer to February. By this time the seeds had become so dry that they had gone into deep dormancy. Special measures will be required to remove them from this state before sowing: treatment with growth stimulants, soaking in humates, etc.

A state of deep dormancy is not characteristic of all seeds. For example, tomatoes have a different feature: they do not go dormant at all, and the seeds can germinate even in the fruit during the ripening process or when drying the seeds if the napkin remains wet for a long time.

Isolation of seeds.

Pepper seeds are initially almost dry, they do not have that moist shell that surrounds tomato seeds. Isolating them from a ripe fruit is as easy as shelling pears: the fruit is cut, the seeds are taken out and separated from the stalk. You can leave them to dry a little or calibrate them immediately.

Seed calibration.

Not all seeds have the same weight and size, and not all are full-bodied. To immediately separate good seeds from immature and lightweight ones, you can fill them with water and mix. Good seeds will settle to the bottom, and the light ones will float, they can be drained along with the water.

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Variety purity and cross-pollination

Whether to engage in home seed production is worth it, each gardener decides for himself. This process is simple, but the results are not always predictable. Although pepper is a self-pollinating crop, the flowers can also be pollinated by insects. Since it is impossible to isolate plants from bees or smaller insects such as thrips, there is a high probability that pollen from another plant will be on the pistil of a flower.

If you only grow one variety of pepper, this does not pose any problem. If there are several varieties, then with a high degree of probability you will get your own hybrid. There is nothing wrong with this if you like all the varieties grown. Keen gardeners can, over the course of a few years, by annually selecting the best plants, create a variety that is optimally suited specifically for this climate and these growing conditions.

Even seeds from first-generation hybrids have the right to life. Of course, most likely the harvest from them will not be as impressive as from the hybrids themselves, but in the first generation there is usually not much splitting, and most of the plants will be very similar to the mother.

You need to be careful when growing sweet and hot peppers in close proximity. Since different varieties may belong to the same pepper species, annual pepper (Capsicum annuum), cross-pollination between them is likely. Sweet peppers suffer more from such a union: the fruits may change shape, become more elongated, their walls will be thinner, and bitterness will appear in the taste.

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Thank you for your interest in my article.

How to Get Your Pepper Seeds

To obtain your own pepper seeds, it is better to use only old and proven varieties of the crop.
The offspring of hybrids marked with the F1 icon rarely inherit the full range of parental characteristics. That is, as a result, the vegetable grower risks growing substandard fruits that have little in common with the parent plant. The quality of seeds collected from plants grown without seedlings is an order of magnitude higher than those obtained from seedlings. But this remark is relevant only for the southern regions of Russia, where the vegetable is mainly cultivated by direct sowing in open ground.

Don't forget to check that there are no hot peppers planted nearby, at a distance of at least two meters. Otherwise, there is a high probability that unwanted cross-pollination will occur. Then next year you will grow bitter fruits. However, by their appearance it will be difficult to distinguish them from the variety you need.

The most viable seeds are produced by peppers that have reached full technical maturity. Such seeds have excellent germination and growth energy.

It is better to select seeds from the fruit immediately after collection. If they become overripe, some of the seeds will have time to hatch and their quality will deteriorate sharply. It is permissible to ripen peppers. As a result, you will get seeds from unripe fruits. But such seed material is unsuitable for long-term storage and must be put into use without reserve next year.

Healthy, well-developed bushes are better suited for the role of queen cells.

The quality of the seeds also depends on the position of the fruits on the plants. Ideally, to obtain seed material, peppers that are the first to form are used, on branches of the first or second order.

You will only need one or two fruits, since each of them contains a huge number of seeds - more than 200 pieces. So you can give your own pepper seeds to your friends and neighbors in the country.

Homemade pepper seeds are extracted as follows:

From the collected fruits, the caps are cut out, including the stalks, part of the pericarp and the seed bearers themselves.
All this is laid out on a piece of paper or a piece of newspaper and dried in the shade in the open air.

If the seeds are scattered and break easily when bent, they are considered sufficiently dry.

Before harvesting for storage, it is advisable to warm the pepper seeds for 20 minutes in water at a temperature of +40 degrees. Then they are dipped in cold water for one to two minutes.

Next, they are dried again until they flow, placed in cloth or paper bags and put away in a dark, dry place until the next season.

Want to learn how to improve seed germination of your homemade pepper seeds in a simple and easy way? Then watch the two-minute video.

Source: ogorodbezzabot.ru

How to select the right seeds

So, you have identified the fruits from which you want to get seeds. They have ripened well and have acquired the characteristic shape and color of the variety. Picked peppers should be kept in the window for a week or two so that they wilt a little. Then cut them with a sharp knife and carefully remove the middle with the seeds. The seeds should fit tightly to the calyx of the stalk. Those located in the sinuses, on the partitions, will not be suitable, as they have received less nutrition. Let the seeds dry on the cup for several days; there is no need to forcibly separate them. After 7-10 days they will easily separate on their own. Place the seeds in a paper bag labeled with the variety (some people have success using tea bags or matchboxes).

Hot pepper seeds are collected in the same way. Just be careful, work with gloves - the seeds can cause burns to the mucous membranes (do not touch your eyes and mouth).