Pepper Growers?

pannaking22

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Anyone on here growing peppers? Doesn't matter how hot they are, all are welcome! I've been wanting to grow my own peppers for years and finally have the space to do some balcony growing, so I'm really excited about that. I picked up a gypsy pepper plant over the weekend at Walmart since it was the one that looked like it wasn't about to keel over. Hoping to expand my species/varieties for next year since it's kind of late to start anything fancy from seed.

I saw a couple older threads on it, but figured a new one was more appropriate to be more general.
 

The Snark

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Being surrounded by pepper growers, while being seriously botanically challenged to the max, one thing I have noticed with many varieties of peppers. If they don't grow quite fast and look vigorous... with just individual plants while others around them are vibrant, they are unthrifty. Peppers are like that. Some just don't take off. If they all are slow growing without luxuriant foliage, they hate the soil they are in.
This happens all the time around here. A field of peppers that barely fruit, 10 or 15 out of a couple of hundred really take off, and a few hundred feet off in another field, the same plants twice the size and loaded down with fruit.
 

pannaking22

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That's one thing I've noticed while reading up on peppers/talking to other people that grow them. The soil really is everything and if the peppers don't like it, good luck getting a good harvest. Fortunately it seems like you can add various things to the plant or soil to get things moving, but even then I'm not sure it's a perfect science. This is also my first time growing anything that's not a succulent or carnivorous plant, so having to think so much about the nutrients of the soil is new to me.
 

AnObeseHippo

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I grow peppers too! Second year trying. Mostly growing habaneros, but one carolina reaper plant. Oddly enough, I find hotter peppers easier to grow. I started sweet red peppers and jalapenos at the same time as my habs, and the plants are nowhere near as compact and bushy as my habs. Like the sweeter the pepper I grow, the worse it grew.

I’ve just started with an all around fertilizer and if my plants look odd, I google what kind of deficiency they have and I add that into the mix. And for soil I just used a bag of generic bag of potting soil meant for fruiting plants. I plan on recycling the soil through a compost pile for next year.

For watering, I just wait until they start to wilt and then they get more. Somehow one of my jalapenos still tried to complain about overwatering even though I treated it more like a succulent than a pepper.

The habs started flowering today, I’ll post some pics when they turn to peppers.
 

pannaking22

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I grow peppers too! Second year trying. Mostly growing habaneros, but one carolina reaper plant. Oddly enough, I find hotter peppers easier to grow. I started sweet red peppers and jalapenos at the same time as my habs, and the plants are nowhere near as compact and bushy as my habs. Like the sweeter the pepper I grow, the worse it grew.

I’ve just started with an all around fertilizer and if my plants look odd, I google what kind of deficiency they have and I add that into the mix. And for soil I just used a bag of generic bag of potting soil meant for fruiting plants. I plan on recycling the soil through a compost pile for next year.

For watering, I just wait until they start to wilt and then they get more. Somehow one of my jalapenos still tried to complain about overwatering even though I treated it more like a succulent than a pepper.

The habs started flowering today, I’ll post some pics when they turn to peppers.
I'll be trying my hand with jalapenos and habaneros next year I think, but I've been looking at a few of the hotter ones too (and some sweeter ones). It's interesting that your hotter ones seem to be growing better, I'd read that they tend to take longer to get going and fruit. Maybe just the ability to put on a bunch of growth and then the fruiting process is longer?

I put some general fertilizer in my pot a couple days ago, so hopefully that jump starts my plant. I used cactus/succulent soil for mine since I have a big bag of it. I'm sure it'll still work fine, plus I'm going to start a small compost bin that I'll be able to slowly mix in later on.

We got some rain last night (first rain in nearly 6 weeks!!!), so I think that takes care of watering everyone for a week lol. The gypsy hasn't looked too bad overall, it might actually be overwatered now.
 

Sillver

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I've grown peppers with my dad for over 10 years. They are not very hard to grow. We never really used fertilizers. We raise chickens and pigeons and just mixed the pop into the dirt. We rarely watered them and they grew great. We would plant about 100 Hot Portugal pepper plants and would get over 1000 -2000 peppers.We are Portuguese so we make pepper sauce(like tomato sauce) for cooking.

About 5 years ago I moved back to canada and I finally started to plant some again this year. I planted 4 Hot Portugal pepper plants and 1 ghost pepper plant. The Hot Portugal peppers are about 50000 Scoville. So it's a decently hot pepper.
 

pannaking22

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Bought two more plants over the weekend, so now my balcony is completely full! Looking forward to getting a good harvest later in the year.
 

pannaking22

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Oooo what kinds did you get? Any idea what you'll do with the harvest?
Red bell (big plant on sale) and one just called "salsa pepper". Depending on the harvest, I'll probably eat most as snacks or use them to cook with. I love using peppers for cooking, either for flavor or for adding heat. I made some really good tacos over the weekend with green bells for texture/filling and habanero for heat and a little bit of extra flavor. If I get too many I'll try my hand at salsa and maybe even pick up some hotter peppers from the grocery store to make some sort of hot sauce. If it goes beyond that I'll probably offer peppers/seeds to people who may want some.
 

The Snark

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I'd add this about growing them. Silt and clay bearing silt appear to not promote healthy flourishing plants. No idea why but around here, the farther from the rivers and that sandy clay bearing loam stuff, the better they grow. Artificial fertilizing seems to make no difference.
 

Galapoheros

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I think I'm growing one pepper plant but I'm not sure. I try so many things, I forget where I put everything. I did get some bell pepper seeds and randomly put some in pots. I think it's the plant on the right in the pot that is a pepper plant. I crushed a leaf and it smells a little bit like a pepper. I think the plant on the left is from a seed I planted also but I'm not sure what that is either. It's growing like a tomato, notice the root. What do you think this is? I did plant some tomatillo seeds here and there. I don't have a garden here so I was just messing around, nothing organized. I plan to do a better job later. Growth seems to me to have a lot to do with genetics, age of the seed, competition, maybe other things because I have planted seeds from the same parents in the same soil, trying to maintain the same conditions but still some will only grow a few inches, never produce, while other individuals close by will grow several feet and produce. I'm referring to tomato and melon plants mostly.


 

pannaking22

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The one on the right definitely looks like a pepper, but I'm not familiar with the one on the left (entomologist by training, I absolutely suck at plant ID lol). I've liked seeing your somewhat haphazard gardening/growing Galapoheros, it's really neat to see all the different plants you're trying! Certainly worthwhile to experiment and see what works out. Shoot, my dad does that sort of thing and the plants seem to do better tossed out in the yard/woods/field rather than started indoors.
 

Nonnack

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I started this year. Always liked it hot, so decided to grow something by myself. But I am not crazy chilli head, eating raw reapers;) hottest peppers I have are habaneros and fatali. Some pics :



























 

pannaking22

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Very nice collection! Have you tried the lemon drops before? I'm curious to what the taste on those would be like. I like my food hot too, but not over the top.
 

Galapoheros

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The one on the right definitely looks like a pepper, but I'm not familiar with the one on the left (entomologist by training, I absolutely suck at plant ID lol). I've liked seeing your somewhat haphazard gardening/growing Galapoheros, it's really neat to see all the different plants you're trying! Certainly worthwhile to experiment and see what works out. Shoot, my dad does that sort of thing and the plants seem to do better tossed out in the yard/woods/field rather than started indoors.

I just looked up "tomatillo seedling", the one on the left is a tomatillo after all. That white sprout I noticed is an orange tree seedling. There was a guy where I used to work approx. 30 years ago that loved growing peppers. He said not watering them often made them hotter, he had to throw a bunch of jalapenos because they were just too hot.
 

Nonnack

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Have you tried the lemon drops before? I'm curious to what the taste on those would be like.
No, I haven't. I heard it has really interesting taste, some people love it, some hate it. I am also curious, have few nice plants of it so soon I think I will try it;)
 

schmiggle

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I just looked up "tomatillo seedling", the one on the left is a tomatillo after all. That white sprout I noticed is an orange tree seedling. There was a guy where I used to work approx. 30 years ago that loved growing peppers. He said not watering them often made them hotter, he had to throw a bunch of jalapenos because they were just too hot.
Makes sense, fruits with more water are probably bigger and therefore less concentrated. You have to be careful not to kill your plant, though...

My dad loves to talk about the grapes in Japan that were the size of a ping pong ball but tastes like water.
 

Nonnack

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With peppers it is easy to see when they need water. Look at this pic of pepper plant with few fruits in white pot, leafs are wilt, its time to water it. After hour or few it will look fine again.
 

8 leg wonder

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If they all are slow growing without luxuriant foliage, they hate the soil they are in.
This happens all the time around here. A field of peppers that barely fruit, 10 or 15 out of a couple of hundred really take off, and a few hundred feet off in another field, the same plants twice the size and loaded down with fruit.[/QUOTE]depends on what you feed them, high nitrogen will produce heavier foliage but less fruit, high potassium feed will produce more fruit.
 

pannaking22

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I've got two fruits forming on my gypsy pepper plant, so I guess I've been doing something right!
 
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