Chillies 2024

I don't grow any sweet peppers @Ademission, just chillies. last year I had great crops with Hungarian Black and Hot Wax plus the Lemon Drops.

This year only the Jalapeno have germinated and one of the 4 seedlings appears to have been grazed by a slimester. The other 4 I sowed are no-shows.

 

3rd year for our "basket of fire" (BOF) plant and used 2 fruit so far as a milder chilly. We use the ripeness of the chilly based on how hot we need the hit and this still stands when frozen. With the BOF this works very well as the fruit goes from green to yellow, yellow/purple, orange and then red.

 

To prune at 6 inches or not to prune chilli plants. There are a few utube videos I have now watched on the comparison on whither to prune or not to prune showing the different stages of growth between the two in separate pots. After watching them I am going to prune.

 

I’m quite new to growing chillies, I’ve got Hungarian Hot Wax and Cayenne in 9cm pots and they’re ready to go into something larger and out into greenhouse. What is a good final size pot for them? Our garden club had a chilli competition last year and we had to stick to a 2 litre pot. Is that large enough or is bigger better? And will ordinary MPC do or top soil, manure etc? Any advice appreciated.

 

Is the competition for quantity of chillies’ or height of plant? There are a number of utube demonstrations comparing plants in different pot sizes and others comparing plants that have been pruned when reaching 6 inches and those that have not been pruned. Some people repot several times into larger and larger pots. Repot when roots can be seen coming through the bottom of the pot. I use MPC with some perilite and add tomato compost if I have any left over but some growers just use tomato compost. Watering is tricky as they can be thirsty blighters but the roots do like standing in water. Good luck.

 

I've grown Hungarian Yellow Wax a few times.
I used 2L pots and 5L pots - the bigger pots gave bigger plants, but there was little difference between the number of chillies. So this year they're all going in 2L pots.

I've found that Jalapeno do produce many more fruits in bigger pots, so I use 5L pots for them.
I've got Basket of Fire - they're small plants anyway, so 2-3L will be big enough.

The big surprise I had a couple of years ago was with Scotch Bonnet.
I had many plants and some remained in the really small square pots (1/2L maybe) others went into 5L pots.
I planned to gift the ones in the small pots, but no one wanted them.
So they stayed on the g/house floor along with the others - they produced masses of fruits - the plants were seriously rootbound and frequently bone dry but they just kept on producing.
Unfortunately I found the taste and smell of the SB a bit off-putting, which is a pity as they were probably the most prolific variety I've ever grown with a fab range of colours too.

To check for watering I just tilt the edge of the top of the pot with a finger - if it feels light it needs water, if it doesn't feel light it's doesn't need watering.
I feed weekly with tomato feed when the first flowers start appearing. so slightly different to tomatoes.

 

Thank you all. I’ll try some 5 litre pots for one of each variety then the others in 2 litre pots, my greenhouse is minuscule (4x4), so space is at a premium. I have tomato compost and feed so looks like everything is set.

 

As a first time Chilli grower this is all very interesting - suggestions of 2L to 10L for pot sizes.
I've bought a number of 30cm pots (approx 10L I think) but will experiment with different sizes.

At the moment my plants (still in relatively small pots) seem to have stalled in growth, but some varieties are significantly taller than others.

I was wondering if anyone here had grown any of the following and had a rough estimate how tall each variety is likely to be, all things equal. Are there any that would need bigger pots than others? Or front row in the polytunnel ?

Older ones - around 4 months old

Padron - (currently around 45cm)
Zitava - (around 40cm)
Criolla - (As above - around 30cm)

Newer ones - around 3 months old

Poblano
Habanada
Shishito
Charleston Biber

Thanks all!

 

Surprise Ainslie is on itv 1 NOW Saturday in a chilli green house.

 

Nutcracker I also have a similar size one with storage space underneath which seems to breed snails. So I have plastic domes for the pots with bands of copper tape around the base. Then jam the domes over the pots and just leave small air holes at the top which keep the blighters out.

 

I had an aji norteno in a 30l pot last year and it reached 6 foot. It's a very tall plant naturally though, I've overwintered it and put it in its final 3l pot, it's about 2 1/2 foot now.

I've found the plants in general will grow taller/bigger with bigger pots, but then we have to consider cropping in our climate, so I'm making it a rule for me that big pots will only be used for peppers that taste good green, like jalapenos. There's quite a range in growth habit too, this is the aji norteno with it's fellow overwintered locotos in the same sized pots. They barely reach a foot and sprawl

 

Thanks @waterbut. If I’ve any copper tape left after sticking it around my new raised beds I’ll use it in the greenhouse. I got some going cheaply at a table top sale, and I find it pretty good for keeping the critters off things.