AMSEED American Seed Intelligence Platform
AMSeed · American Seed Intelligence Platform https://amseed.com/varieties/carolina-reaper-pepper
Pepper variety

Carolina Reaper

Open-pollinated pepper

Breeding
Open-pollinated
Growth habit
-
Days to maturity
90-120 days
1 independent reference · basis unstated
Fruit
red
Weight
-
Bred by
-

Grey captions say what stands behind that particular figure. Breeding, growth habit and fruit characters carry no caption because they rest on the record's sources as a whole rather than citing their own; closing that gap is ordinary outstanding work, not a finished job.

The species here is supported by Peppers: Vegetable and Spice Capsicums. These claims name their own evidence rather than resting on the record's source list as a whole, because a species that distinguishes a variety, or an attribution to a breeding programme, is worth being able to check on its own.

Also known as

NameKindNote
HP22B Breeder code Ed Currie's original breeding code, still used in seed trade listings.

Origin & history

Bred by Ed Currie in South Carolina from a Pakistani Naga and a Red Habanero, and certified by Guinness in 2013 as the world's hottest pepper, a title it held for a decade. The scorpion tail and pebbled skin are its signature.

Measurements

MeasurementValueContext
Days to maturity 90-120 days Consensus range across the cited independent references.
Scoville heat 1,600,000-2,200,000 SHU Guinness-certified average of 1,569,300 SHU with peak pods far higher

Against the rest of the pepper database

Where this variety sits among every pepper we hold a comparable figure for. Position is not merit: earlier is not better than later, and hotter is not better than milder. Only cultivar-level figures are compared, never trial results, and maturity is only ranked against figures counted the same way.

Days to maturity 90-120 days · ranked at its midpoint, 105
55 median 82.5 155

later than 76% of the 252 peppers we hold a figure for. None of these figures state whether they are counted from sowing or from transplant, so they are ranked against each other on the assumption that suppliers use one convention, which is not something any of them says.

Scoville heat 1600000-2200000 SHU · ranked at its midpoint, 1,900,000
0 median 5,000 1,900,000

hotter than 100% of the 249 peppers we hold a figure for.

Traits

Disease resistance

No documented disease resistance, typical of heirlooms and older open-pollinated varieties. See pepper diseases for the cultural playbook that fills the gap.

Related varieties

Explore all pepper varieties · compare any two · when to plant it where you are

Sources & References

Evidence: 2 sources, all independent references.

  1. Chile Pepper Institute research and variety releases · New Mexico State University, University or Government
  2. Peppers: Vegetable and Spice Capsicums · CABI (2012), Scholarly Reference