Pepper/chilli plants flowering looking for advice

Heroditas

Technophobe wrote: »

Looking good Heroditas...
..thought you were supposed to be sharing that greenhouse!!

Shush you, you troublemaker! :P

In the next few weeks I'm going to be building a cat run going from the glasshouse along the fence where the flower bed is.
Anyway, they still can sun themselves on the cold frame!

Sulla Felix

I gave chilli growing a go in the spring with a devon chilli farm set I got for xmas. Nothing grew except a bit of mold.. I guess combination of cold and damp, even though I followed the instructions.

It's there any point in giving it another go this late? Wouldn't expect a crop but at least they might germinate this time since the big south facing window gets a but of sun now.

Denis322

Sulla Felix wrote: »

I gave chilli growing a go in the spring with a devon chilli farm set I got for xmas. Nothing grew except a bit of mold.. I guess combination of cold and damp, even though I followed the instructions.

It's there any point in giving it another go this late? Wouldn't expect a crop but at least they might germinate this time since the big south facing window gets a but of sun now.

You could always grow them just to overwinter them. That way, you'd have strong plants next year and have bumper crop. Plus, there's always a chance of a few small chillis this year from easy to grow varieties, as if you keep them indoors they can produce chillis well into November and later.

Outkast_IRE

Sulla Felix wrote: »

I gave chilli growing a go in the spring with a devon chilli farm set I got for xmas. Nothing grew except a bit of mold.. I guess combination of cold and damp, even though I followed the instructions.

It's there any point in giving it another go this late? Wouldn't expect a crop but at least they might germinate this time since the big south facing window gets a but of sun now.

Ok simple to sort ....... What varieties did you get to grow ?
When you planted the seeds in some compost to germinate did you keep it in a very warm area ? like a hot press or similar ?

redser7

Sulla Felix wrote: »

I gave chilli growing a go in the spring with a devon chilli farm set I got for xmas. Nothing grew except a bit of mold.. I guess combination of cold and damp, even though I followed the instructions.

It's there any point in giving it another go this late? Wouldn't expect a crop but at least they might germinate this time since the big south facing window gets a but of sun now.

Sow some seed now but also buy in some plants. Go to a good garden centre and you could get a nice well maintained and mature plant in flower. A bit of a cheat but just for this year

Sulla Felix

Denis322 wrote: »

You could always grow them just to overwinter them. That way, you'd have strong plants next year and have bumper crop. Plus, there's always a chance of a few small chillis this year from easy to grow varieties, as if you keep them indoors they can produce chillis well into November and later.

Outkast_IRE wrote: »

Ok simple to sort ....... What varieties did you get to grow ?
When you planted the seeds in some compost to germinate did you keep it in a very warm area ? like a hot press or similar ?

redser7 wrote: »

Sow some seed now but also buy in some plants. Go to a good garden centre and you could get a nice well maintained and mature plant in flower. A bit of a cheat but just for this year

Ok, I've started another set. Jalapeno, Ring of Fire, Hungarian Hot Wax. In their tray, in the hot press. Let's see!


I also bought a cayenne from the gardening shop... iddqd


Follow on question: How viable are seeds from packaged foods? I've a jar of bee-yoo-tee-ful hot and sweet cherry peppers in the fridge. How likely would the seeds be to germinate?

redser7

They could well germinate but there are a couple of problems. They mightn't come true and produce the same peppers. Also they might not be suitable for our climate. There are types that will do well in our northern summers and its a good idea to try these if you want a decent yield. Some even do well enough in a poor Irish summer.

Heroditas

Rule of thumb - the hotter the chilli, the more difficult it is to propagate the seeds.
I usually get about a 75% success rate with my seeds, falling to about 30% for the really hot ones.

Outkast_IRE

Sulla Felix wrote: »

Ok, I've started another set. Jalapeno, Ring of Fire, Hungarian Hot Wax. In their tray, in the hot press. Let's see!


I also bought a cayenne from the gardening shop... iddqd


Follow on question: How viable are seeds from packaged foods? I've a jar of bee-yoo-tee-ful hot and sweet cherry peppers in the fridge. How likely would the seeds be to germinate?

Ok key things, tips I used when germinating before I got propogator is the following
1. Ensure they are only a few millimetres under the compost.
2. I assume you gave the compost a good wetting.
3. If you are rewetting the compost, use water at room temperature not straight from the tap the cold water wont help.
4. The hot press is only a good spot if its actually very warm most of the time, you would be surprised that a lot of hot presses aren't actually that hot anymore thanks to very well insulated cylinders etc. The next best thing is a spot in the sun on a windowsill with a card over the top to stop the light until they germinate.

When potting up I highly recommend a John Innes based compost and mix it with perlite and vermiculite.

Seeds from chillis you buy there are problems.

1. You don't know the health condition of the parent plant, I was unfortunate enough to take some scotch bonnet seeds from a fruit whose parent plant must of been suffering from bacterial spot, and the seeds were infected too. This could mean you spend a month or two growing before the symptoms of the disease show up. For how cheap the seeds are to buy, I wouldn't take the risk.

2. As previous poster stated, there is a likelihood of ending up with a hybrid plant, again you wont know usually till it fruits itself months down the line and the fruits look nothing like the ones you took it from.

Heroditas

Quick update for you guys. Just sticking up a photo of some of my plants in the glasshouse. As you can see, I'm now getting a crop!

talkabout

Those plants are looking fantastic, mine are very slow this year. Whats your secret

Heroditas

talkabout wrote: »

Those plants are looking fantastic, mine are very slow this year. Whats your secret

I planted the seeds in an Aerogarden in mid February so they had full-spectrum lights shining on them 16 hours a day in the utility room which was nice and toasty with the tumble dryer and washing machine running a lot.
I then repotted them around the second week of April and had them up on the window sill in the spare bedroom facing west for another few weeks before finally repotting them again and putting them out in the glasshouse about 4 weeks ago.

talkabout

It certainly worked, they look very healthy. I'm happy enough with my own but i'm a few weeks behind on last year. I have one or two chilli's coming on my Cherry Bomb and Ring of Fire.

rgiller

Are you keeping them in 3" pots or are those a bit bigger? It's hard to tell the scale in the pictures. Do they get fed with anything?

Heroditas

Some are 4", some are 6".
A load of them now need to get bumped up into bigger pots because the roots are filling the pots now.
I feed them Chilli Focus once a week.

Edit: they're all 6" pots in that picture.

Outkast_IRE

Was away on hols the last few weeks but I have an update with photos here now. the main points are .

1. Look at the ones in the black chilli grow containers they have raced ahead of the standard pots especially the purple jalapeno.
2. The last few weeks have seen massive growth in the plants, I would imagine all of them will be flowering in the next few weeks.

General Look


Purple Jalapeno Chilligrow Pot.


Purple Jalapeno Flower Close up


Purple Jalapeno Fruit Beginning to Emerge


Long Slim Cayanne In chilli grow container


3 plants in Chilli grow container


Another 3 plants in Chilli grow container


Purple Jalapeno in standard pot


Standard Pots

Denis322

My Dorset Naga is only about 6 1/2 inches and I can see a few flowers coming through.
Do you think I should wait for them come up and then cut them off or do you think I should leave them be?

Outkast_IRE

Denis322 wrote: »

My Dorset Naga is only about 6 1/2 inches and I can see a few flowers coming through.
Do you think I should wait for them come up and then cut them off or do you think I should leave them be?

What size container is the Naga in ?

Personally I would leave them be, and pollinate them if you want fruit. At this time of the year if you keep cutting off flower heads you could be into Oct/Nov before harvest.

I have found the plant will still grow plenty when fruiting once its in a big enough pot.

Denis322

They're in 6 inch pots. I'll leave them be so. Thanks

Heroditas

I sampled one of my cayenne chillies last night. It's still a relatively light green colour.
Quite sweet and not too much heat. I'll have to leave them until they're a nice red colour before trying them again.
Far too mild for me!

Outkast_IRE

Denis322 wrote: »

They're in 6 inch pots. I'll leave them be so. Thanks

6 inch pot would be the minimum for these plants, I use 6 inch pots when I have multiples of the same plant and don't need a bumper crop from 1 plant.

If I had only 1 plant I would aim for 9 or 12 inch large pot.

Second Captain

Hi,
I have a question for the chili gurus. I bought a 'Pick-a-Hot-Pep' chili plant in April. It was about 10" tall and had a decent crop of about 15 green and red fruit on it already but only one or two flower buds. Transferred it to a 9" pot on a window sill. The peppers originally on it were all harvested over the first month and there has been one or two more produced each week which is a production rate that suites me fine. The plant itself has not gotten much taller but has produced lots of small leaves in clusters around the ends of the main branches.

Now, I think it enjoyed the recent sunny weather because now there is suddenly about 100 flower buds on it (yes, I counted). To this novice, it seems an unfeasibly large number of potential fruit for such a small plant to produce and just physically support at the same time. Should I remove a proportion of them or just count myself lucky?

I also spotted some green or white fly on just one flower bud and a couple of adjacent leaves while counting so hopefully, after sparying that, I have caught a potential infestation just in time. My only other chili plant growing attempt was last summer in a plastic greenhouse and that fell victim to a massive infestation of greenfly - after a few initial fruit, it produced nothing else.

Outkast_IRE

Second Captain wrote: »

Hi,
I have a question for the chili gurus. I bought a 'Pick-a-Hot-Pep' chili plant in April. It was about 10" tall and had a decent crop of about 15 green and red fruit on it already but only one or two flower buds. Transferred it to a 9" pot on a window sill. The peppers originally on it were all harvested over the first month and there has been one or two more produced each week which is a production rate that suites me fine. The plant itself has not gotten much taller but has produced lots of small leaves in clusters around the ends of the main branches.

Now, I think it enjoyed the recent sunny weather because now there is suddenly about 100 flower buds on it (yes, I counted). To this novice, it seems an unfeasibly large number of potential fruit for such a small plant to produce and just physically support at the same time. Should I remove a proportion of them or just count myself lucky?

I also spotted some green or white fly on just one flower bud and a couple of adjacent leaves while counting so hopefully, after sparying that, I have caught a potential infestation just in time. My only other chili plant growing attempt was last summer in a plastic greenhouse and that fell victim to a massive infestation of greenfly - after a few initial fruit, it produced nothing else.

Good job catching the greenfly, I caught a few of the buggers on my pararie fire plants, but going through it leaf by leaf I seem to of stopped it by crushing them one by one.

Personally I wouldn't bother removing any of the flower buds, I would pollinate them all and you will probably find that some of them will naturally drop off. The plant isn't going to kill itself to support more than it can, it will reach a level its comfortable with and drop any flowers it doesn't want to support.

What I would keep an eye on is the weight of the plant with so many fruits, you may want to put in a support cane to help it.

I would also recommend getting a good chilli plant food such as Chilli Focus.
http://www.southdevonchillifarm.co.uk/shop/chill-focus-plant-food.html

Best of luck

Second Captain

Thanks. I'll just keep an eye on it so. I suppose I am concerned at getting a large crop of punny fruit but we'll just see how it plays out. The plant came with a couple of sturdy canes in place so the centre is well supported. I might have a to put a crutch of sorts under a couple of the lateral branches if all the flower buds on the ends of them bear fruit. It would be a nice problem to have! I'll keep an eye out for that feed. I've given it a weekly dose of general purpose plant food but something more specialist is well worth a couple of quid.

Outkast_IRE

Second Captain wrote: »

Thanks. I'll just keep an eye on it so. I suppose I am concerned at getting a large crop of punny fruit but we'll just see how it plays out. The plant came with a couple of sturdy canes in place so the centre is well supported. I might have a to put a crutch of sorts under a couple of the lateral branches if all the flower buds on the ends of them bear fruit. It would be a nice problem to have! I'll keep an eye out for that feed. I've given it a weekly dose of general purpose plant food but something more specialist is well worth a couple of quid.

1 litre of the chilli focus would do you for 1 plant for years, I have about 20 plants and would get a year out of my current 1 litre bottle.

Don't worry too much about supporting lateral branches the plant should bulk up those branches in response to the increasing weight.

Technophobe

Yep, I discovered greenfly on some of mine yesterday too..:(

Outkast_IRE

Technophobe wrote: »

Yep, I discovered greenfly on some of mine yesterday too..:(

they are a bollox , im doing regular checks on my plants and catching the odd one, for some reason they are attracted to the Prarie Fire Variety, I have half a dozen plant varieities and the prarie fire ones are the only ones I found a good couple on.

Technophobe

I gave all of mine a good spraying with soapy water last night...hopefully will help...

tara m

Hello Chilli Fans!

Cut a long story short - I am a gardener, trained at Kew in London and I'm in the process of setting up a chilli farm here in Limerick, near Newcastle West. Would this be somewhere you would visit? We will plan to be open for next spring, and hope to grow the largest variety of chillies in Ireland. What else would you like to see at a Chilli Farm - some talks and courses? A chilli dedicated shop? Any feedback greatly appreciated, and free tickets for the first weekend, Promise!

Thanks for your input - Tara

Outkast_IRE

tara m wrote: »

Hello Chilli Fans!

Cut a long story short - I am a gardener, trained at Kew in London and I'm in the process of setting up a chilli farm here in Limerick, near Newcastle West. Would this be somewhere you would visit? We will plan to be open for next spring, and hope to grow the largest variety of chillies in Ireland. What else would you like to see at a Chilli Farm - some talks and courses? A chilli dedicated shop? Any feedback greatly appreciated, and free tickets for the first weekend, Promise!

Thanks for your input - Tara

To be fair, unless your offering something really special I don't think I would specifically travel to limerick just for plants, do you expect people to pay to visit a chilli farm ? its just when you mentioned tickets it has me wondering ? Surely your business model will revolve around
A. Selling Chillis to market.
B. Selling Seedling plants, or mature plants.
C. Perhaps selling your own seeds if your confident they aren't hybrids.
D. Sales of related equipment.

Im from cork so its only about 1hr 15mins away.

What I would consider visiting for is if some of the chilli growing equipment was available at competitive prices.

I can say for example in Cork city the only place I have found that stocks John Innes Compost is B&Q and they only stock No1 and No3 mixes.
Perlite and Vermiculite also B&Q is the only place I have found it.

Therefore I am forced to buy these simple products in B&Q.

Products like Chilligrow, I must order online from the UK http://www.greenhousesensation.co.uk/planters/chilligrow.html

or for plant food Chilli focus i must order online from UK http://www.southdevonchillifarm.co.uk/shop/chill-focus-plant-food.html

Also things like quality heated propagators etc can be awkward to fine.

I wish you all the best with your endeavour, as I can tell you from experience the range of chillis stocked in supermarkets here is dire, they are mostly imported from Kenya etc and aren't in the best condition by the time they arrive.

Im growing about 6 types of chillis this year myself, and all are coming along successfully.