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Might sound silly but.....

jubjubrsx

jubjubrsx

Since I have such a huge variety of plants growing in pots, I know this might sound kind of silly but here goes. Would the different species of plants have problems if the leaves were touching each other? I'm starting to run into crowding issues with my limited space. Just curious cause I'd like to make sure different plants wont like fight and release toxins and kill the other plants.
 
you can kind of tell by the pic
10580691_10154448295515074_507482092899412609_o.jpg

 
thanks.
 
They should be fine for now. But you will need to move them. Something like 1.5 feet apart, when they start to flower so they won't cross pollinate.
 
Other than that, lookin good !
 
Other than cross pollinating (perhaps you're not concerned about it), it may be a good idea to move them apart to increase some air-flow. Nice looking group you've got there!
 
OneHighJedi said:
They should be fine for now. But you will need to move them. Something like 1.5 feet apart, when they start to flower so they won't cross pollinate.
 
Other than that, lookin good !
Click to expand...
 
Actually you would need to move them quite a bit further apart to prevent cross pollination. Wind and insects can carry pollen great distances, many miles in fact.
 
Don't worry about the leaves touching each other at all, Pepper plants love to be grown close to each other, especially when planted in the ground. The term for this type of growing is "clumping", where you may plant individual plants around a foot from each other.
They provide each other support on windy days, provide shade for each other and generally create their own "micro climate" that benfits the plants greatly. In hotter areas the temperature in this micro climate can be as much as say 10 degrees celcius cooler than the surrounding air and when you consider that pepper plants grow best around 24 celcius you can see why your plants would love this.
 
No problem with the crowding.  They will compete for sun and space and some will suffer because of it.  Just rearrange as needed.  The cross polinating is an unavoidable situation (assuming you want isolated pod seeds so next years plants grow true for you, or anyone you trade with) without protecting the blooms from wind blown pollen and flying insects (pollinators).  Most people use some form of fine mesh bags to cover a branch with blooms on it before they open.  In the wedding section at a Hobby Lobby or craft store you can find these bags.  The larger the better.  Small bags will work good on small pod varieties but not so well on larger pods.  Too hot in the bag and frequent bloom drop.
 
I think the seperation distance is like 1/2 mile to safely avoid CP.
 
The close in approach really increases the attraction of benificial insects.  Lady bugs, Lace Wings, and Anoles.
 
Good luck.
Mike
 
jubjubrsx said:
Since I have such a huge variety of plants growing in pots, I know this might sound kind of silly but here goes. Would the different species of plants have problems if the leaves were touching each other? I'm starting to run into crowding issues with my limited space. Just curious cause I'd like to make sure different plants wont like fight and release toxins and kill the other plants.
 
you can kind of tell by the pic
 
thanks.
Click to expand...
no problem, my brazilian starfish(bacctum) are growing into my reapers / morugas(chinense)
 
all kinda in one big row / clump lol
IMG_20140724_114734.jpg
 
The two main issues are that as they become larger they will be shading each other more and more so they'll grow slower, yet leggier.  You'll end up with a lower pod to stem ratio and it may become difficult to evenly water them.
 
2nd issue is if one becomes diseased it is more likely to infect adjacent plants.
 
on the bright side, growing that close together lets the plants "intertwine" their branches creating more of a "hedge row" that is good for support in strong wind/bad weather
 
Great topic, and watching as I kind of overdid it this year too, only in a raised bed.  28 plants in a 2' x 20' bed.
 
Awesome! Thanks for all the great responses. I mostly just thought of this today because in my reef tank if different types of coral start touching they will "burn" each other and kill the weaker of the corals.
 
To be honest I'm not really worried about cross pollination one bit.(Actually I wouldnt mind some crazy crossbreeds.) To be honest I'm actually just ecstatic that everything is growing properly. 
 
Thats great info on the clumping info since recently its been super windy here, and this week its been in the 100+ degree range out. 
 
I've noticed in some of the other area's I've just moved plants around so the big boys wont shade the smaller ones.
 
Jaunitos - Thanks for the pic, apparently I was worried over nothing.
 
Great topic,  i hae a similar problem but I give them artificial light and I rotate the plants every other day so they are not too crowded.. seems to work thus far.  Ive been getting a ton of lacewings(which ive been killing thinking they were bad) .  Right now they are all flowering which is pretty awesome.
 
I'll +1 the clumping strategy. I like to put plants of the same variety in ground in a triangle about 1' on a side. The trio of plants can better resist the wind and the mini clump puts out more pods than a single plant in the same spot would.
 
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