I hope you work out what is best for you, Marty. While I love your content, being local and relevant, I understand your need to keep it real for you and your family. Sadly, it is true that everything is growing very sophisticated and over produced on the internet. I am more and more often seeking out the real down to earth backyard stuff and giving up the divas. I hope to be following you for a long time, whatever you do. I need to keep it simple these days.

I have a chili that looks a lot like that one, but thankfully for me, it is not too hot, just a little bit of a sting. I was given a cutting by my brother in law from Yamba about 8 yrs ago and I am still just keeping the plant alive. Poor thing has been through some extremes of weather here, but lives on.

This is my 8yr old chili plant, as you can see, it is a bit gnarly, but I get more than enough fruit from it for my uses. :)

I am new, so I am not sure if this is a topic that has been raised before, but I wondered how you all feel about a seed swap. Just a small, voluntary offer if anyone has surplus to requirements at any time?

@Bradley White Oooh, commiserations. 😩

I only have a very small yard in an over 50s village, so most of mine are dwarf varieties. I have lemon, lime, blueberry, mulberry, peach, tamarillo and a pretty good grape vine. Also have feral strawberries after they escaped from their pots a few years ago, now it is a competition between me and the slugs to see who gets the most as they are sprawled all over the place like a groundcover. I have a fruit fly problem and a bird scavenger problem, so some of mine is netted, but some of it can't be. I had cape gooseberries, but the bugs got into them. Rosellas bushes got drowned in a long wet spell. :(

@Jennifer Jones I have these awful Koels that come down from New Guinea each spring and they make an awful noise and eat as much fruit as they can, but usually a few bites out of each fruit. I would be happy to share if they ate a whole fruit and left the rest, but they ruin the lot if I don't net the trees. I love my little food forest, lots of veggies and herbs and then fruit for the grandkids to pick and eat when they visit.

Thanks, but I don't watch tv at all. I check the weather online via WillyWeather, or for long range I use Meteoblue.

@Marty Ware Oh, ok. I thought it was on tv. Duh. 🤭