When you see the Chillihead Secluded Variety badge in a chillie's description, it means that seeds for that variety have been harvested from a "Secluded" plants.

What are "Secluded Plants"?

"Secluded Plants" are plants grown in a controlled environment where we control the plants exposure to insect pollinators and airborne pollen from other plants. "Secluded" plants are separated from other plants, protected from insect pollinators and sheltered from airborn pollen. All "secluded" plants are hand pollinated whenever possible to further ensure self pollination.

Here we have done everything possible from our side to reduce the chances of cross pollination. Even more so, we have beefed up standard methods of isolation to further reduce the chances of cross pollination.

Our vision and commitment is to stabilizing varities within our "Seclusion" programme. We envisage that this commitment will see improved stability in these varieties in future generations to come.

While it is not completely possible to entirely exclude airborne pollen from plants, chances of cross pollination through airborne pollen are greatly reduced in our "Seclusion" programme. This having been said, there is no guaranteed method of completely "Isolating" capsicum plants from airborne pollen. But, we believe that our methods of "Seclusion" will produce improved results.

Please note that "Seclusion" does not guarantee stability. We endeavor to keep varieties secluded and with time, hope to see more stable varieties in our "Seclusion" programme. Please check our variety descriptions for more details on this.

When seeds are labelled as "Secluded", it means that:

•     Seeds that we grow from have been sourced from a reputable & reliable source. Wherever possible we have sourced seeds directly from the origin grower.
•     Seeds are derived from plants grown by us locally in South Africa.
•     Plants have been separated out from other plants as buds begin to show and before they open.
•     Plants are bagged with an ultra fine muslin (± 7x finer than tulle/insect/mosquito netting) before flowers start to open.
•     As much as possible flowers are hand pollinated to ensure self pollination.
•     We have done everything possible to reduce the chances of cross pollination.
•     We only sell on seeds from plants & pods that show correct traits and are true to that particular variety.
•     All seeds sold as "Secluded" are harvested from pods as shown in the pictures provided.