Cordon Training of Sweet Peppers / Capsicums

Does anyone do this? I've always let them just develop as a "bush", but on Beechgrove 19th June 2014 Jim was training his up a string [i.e. like an indeterminate Tomato] as a Cordon. The Factsheet 12 from the show says:

"Jim is also growing a range of sweet pepper plants under glass this year. These plants grow in a triangular shape, as if they are balancing on a point. When the plant produces a flower it also produces two shoots, resulting in this growth formation – it means that the plants can become top heavy.

Jim advised removing one shoot beside the flower so that only one remains. This will continue to grow like a cordon up a string and should be treated as such. The idea is to produce fewer but decent sized peppers."

 

Found the episode on YouTube [Link to StartPoint]

 

Until watching beechgrove I didn realise you could "cordon" peppers , but I have done with Aubergines so how daft am I , its the best gardening program on tv , but I wish they had picked another presenter rather than Chris Beardshaw as the pompous words he uses constantly in one sentence drives me crazy , would suit a "Mills and Boon" novel not a gardening program.

 

I saw that when broadcast too Kristen, but have continued to grow my peppers this year, like you, in a bush fashion. It's been a good year for peppers as I have had to remove about a dozen from two plants yesterday as they where pulling the plants over and trailing on the soil.

I'll wait and see how well Jim's plants do later on in another programme before trying that, something about taking flowers off that I don't like.

Steve...

 

Agreed. Would be much better that they had employed a Scottish presenter, like the others, to keep the original style.

He was only taking off side shoots (ideally before they start to carry a flower), or have I mis-understood?

 

No have not missed anything Kristen, but to me, taking of the sideshoots is like removing fruits.

Steve...

 

Here are a couple of shots of two of my four pepper plants this year, taken on 16th June. If I had of treated these plants as a cordon, I dont think I would have got so many fruits on these plants.





Here is the first harvest, collected yesterday from those same two plants 3 weeks later. All big fruits (large mug in photo for sense of scale), there are still 4 or 5 fruits left on each plant to continue growing, and flowers too.



Now, if I had of grown them as a cordon, I doubt very much I would have had such a return from these plants.

Steve...

 

I did wonder about that. Jim said "They will produce more than enough for anyone" which to me sounded like "Not as many as if you didn't grow them Cordon" but I also wondered if you took one side shoot off, each time it branched, whether it would put more "top" on instead?

Only way to tell is to try some side-by-side

 

the plant will have a flower in the axil of the leaf and the new shoot just above the flower that needs to be taken off.

They picked a English presenter as soon as it was broadcast across the UK and not just in Scotland why is beyond me I would of preferred Toby Buckland or Alice Fowler who you see very little off.

 

Must admit I myself have never grown peppers like this but I think it might be how its done commercially, I remember years ago someone telling me that pepper plants that are grown for supermarket produce usually are very tall.
I think it will give you better quality peppers, but peppers, I find do need a longer growing season than toms, in general, and those of us without the head room just go for the bush effect.