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New Grower in Barcelona NEEDS help (Light and Pinching?) , etc...

barcelona-hot

barcelona-hot

Hello to all from sunny & hot Barcelona.
 
I'm new here, and relatively new to growing.
I'm taking advantage of my new garden / outdoor space to try my hand at growing some super, and not-so-super hots.
I germinated seeds back in April and now have 13+ separate plants comprised of:
 
Carolina Reaper Chocolate
7-Pod Jigsaw
Habanero Lemon
Early Jalapeño
(all purchased online from http://www.pepperseeds.eu)
 
I've got some questions and concerns ... and I'm sure you all can help me out...
I transplanted all to their final pots (similar to 5-gal buckets) about 2-3 weeks ago ... and now my plants are really taking off ... albeit a bit slower than I expected.
My main concerns are whether or not to leave them in FULL DIRECT SUNLIGHT  as well as PINCHING....
1.  FULL SUN or SEMI SHADE?
2.  PINCH BUDS or NO? (my plants are ALL only about 8-10 inches tall ... and are starting to branch, and spread ....but are not as tall as I had imagined/expected)
 
Last year I crowded a bunch of cayenne plants into a couple of pots and grew them in the same place in full sunlight ... even though I had 5-6 plants in each pot, they all produced good fruit ... but I noticed some sever POT-BOUND conditions when I cleaned the pots in early winter ...
 
I just want to avoid stupid mistakes to try to get a maximum yield from these plants ... I'm sure you can all give me some great help....
 
Thanks in advance.
Hasta pronto!
 
Barcelona-hot.
 
Full sun is always better. If your plants are already under the sun full time there's no need to harden them off.
If your pinch the buds it will focus on growing, if you let the buds, it will focus on producing the fruits. It's up to you!
 
 
 
Its really up to the grower if they want to pinch them off. Me personally i never do that and just let them grow naturally. I myself grow two plants in one pot sometimes and they don't seem to be bothered by root bind either.
 
A lot of people swear you need to give peppers around 6 to 8 hours of sun a day but i live in a area with a lot of trees and clouds, not to mention wind and i got about 10 super hots on a raised back porch with only about 4 or 5 hours of direct sunlight a day and they do just fine. I got my other taller pepper varieties in a patch that only gets about 3 to 4 hours of direct sunlight and they do fine. 
 
It really depends a lot of the growers growing habits. Pepper plants are very resilient plants and they adapt to certain environments very well in my opinion.
 
I think with proper care there is no need to pinch off. Mine are still pretty small and already producing peppers but theyre still getting decent vegetative growth so im happy. I also have a very long grow season here in southern california so i get steady yields all through summer and fall.
 
". I also have a very long grow season here in southern california "...

Probably similar to Barcelona, but maybe more humidity here...
 
I use to pinch flowers but i just stay on top of fertilizing and my plants continue to grow well and still produce peppers. By the time fall comes my plants are big and i get a second harvest. I personally prefer a steady supply of peppers instead of one giant harvest.
 
I can't seem to link to my photos on my media sharing site...
But here's a link to a shared folder that's got 3 pics of my plants... comments welcome, of course ...
More than anything, I'm curious to see if the link works....
 
 
 
 
 
 
Plants look really healthy RJM. Nice photos too and a very neat setup you got going.
 
Out of interest did you top off any of your plants?
 
KAOS said:
Plants look really healthy RJM. Nice photos too and a very neat setup you got going.
 
Out of interest did you top off any of your plants?
Click to expand...
No, I haven't topped off any of them ... I may try half of them to see which produce better results ...
I've got (from right to left in the line-up photo) 3 Jalapeños, 4 Reapers, 2 Habaneros and 3 7-Pod Jigsaw ... so I can do some trials ...
 
I transplanted them about 2 weeks ago from tiny plastic pots to these ...IKEA trash bins that only cost me 1 Euro a piece (*cheaper than pots or buckets)
 
Yesterday I was a little worried about their growth, but today I noticed that their stalks/trunks are really thickening up, and they seem to have started to push up vertically as well as spreading out wider.... yesterday was gusty and they seemed to withstand the bending pretty well....
 
Keeping my fingerss crossed....
Hasta pronto.
 
You could Top one or another just to see how they do

I might be wrong but I think it's late to top them all...

They're looking good for seeds started on april though
 
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