Hello,
I've got a question about flowers/fruiting for our hot pepper growing community.
I've got 4 groups of various hot pepper varieties growing in my basement, each group with different germination dates. The oldest of the 4 groups has now been flowering for a little while. On my regular "red cayenne" plants, all of the flowers are turning into peppers, but it's a different story for my orange habanero plants.
On the Habaneros, a few of the flowers are actually becoming pepper fruits, but most of them seem to be falling off once they fully open up and the tiny green pepper begins emerging. This happens at a rate of 4-6 flowers falling per day per plant. This is happening even though they're under the same growing conditions as the red cayennes which aren't dealing with this problem. My Scorpions/Reapers/Chocolate Habs/Ghosts are further behind and aren't flowering just yet.
Here are some specifics to my growing environment:
- 12 hours of light per day (on timer)
- 8 bulb grow light fixture (4 bulbs 6500K 4 bulbs 2700K), also 1 big 6500K CFL bulb (see photo)
- Regular fertilized cycle: 1 week fish emulsion, 1 week CalMag (all to specs on bottles), occasional MiracleGro mixed in every third week.
- Sown in Miracle Gro potting soil.
- Most plants were "topped" in their earlier stages, and are now growing 3-4 main branches.
- I run a regular household fan on them all for 2 hours a day (medium setting to simulate light breeze)
Here is a photo to show the health of one of the orange habanero plants in an 8 inch pot. The three flowers at the bottom fell off recently. In my eye, the plant looks healthy, nice and green with lots of flowers, but maybe someone out there can spot something I cannot. I'm really hoping someone can help me identify and remedy the problem of the flowers falling off.
Here is a photo of my growing setup as well:
I've got a question about flowers/fruiting for our hot pepper growing community.
I've got 4 groups of various hot pepper varieties growing in my basement, each group with different germination dates. The oldest of the 4 groups has now been flowering for a little while. On my regular "red cayenne" plants, all of the flowers are turning into peppers, but it's a different story for my orange habanero plants.
On the Habaneros, a few of the flowers are actually becoming pepper fruits, but most of them seem to be falling off once they fully open up and the tiny green pepper begins emerging. This happens at a rate of 4-6 flowers falling per day per plant. This is happening even though they're under the same growing conditions as the red cayennes which aren't dealing with this problem. My Scorpions/Reapers/Chocolate Habs/Ghosts are further behind and aren't flowering just yet.
Here are some specifics to my growing environment:
- 12 hours of light per day (on timer)
- 8 bulb grow light fixture (4 bulbs 6500K 4 bulbs 2700K), also 1 big 6500K CFL bulb (see photo)
- Regular fertilized cycle: 1 week fish emulsion, 1 week CalMag (all to specs on bottles), occasional MiracleGro mixed in every third week.
- Sown in Miracle Gro potting soil.
- Most plants were "topped" in their earlier stages, and are now growing 3-4 main branches.
- I run a regular household fan on them all for 2 hours a day (medium setting to simulate light breeze)
Here is a photo to show the health of one of the orange habanero plants in an 8 inch pot. The three flowers at the bottom fell off recently. In my eye, the plant looks healthy, nice and green with lots of flowers, but maybe someone out there can spot something I cannot. I'm really hoping someone can help me identify and remedy the problem of the flowers falling off.
Here is a photo of my growing setup as well:
