harvesting ? About when you harvest and some pictures.

[Zodiac_Speaking]

Hello again. I wanted to ask when you guys harvest your peppers, do you wait until they are all ripe before harvesting? For instance, in the one picture where I have a small reaper, there are about 9 other reapers on that same plant that are still green. So do I pick the ripe one or let it hang out and wait for the others to catch up? Same question about the Habaneros. I included a picture of my Habs with my hand behind them for scale. I'm very proud of these Habs. IMHO, they are big, beautiful, and look amazing. (Oh they have the heat)

The picture of several peppers are some Habs that are turning "ripe" inside and some of my Ornamental Thai Hot peppers. They look like little coffee beans.

 

[HellfireFarm]

I like to wait until fully ripe, but when I'm doing a harvest for market I often pick some that aren't fully ripe - it's not hard to do accidentally.

At the end of the season I'll pick a lot of less ripe ones and let them ripen as much as possible before drying/roasting/whatever.

 

[Downriver]

...So do I pick the ripe one or let it hang out and wait for the others

I pick them as they ripen. It encourages the plant to continue reproduction, which means more flowers and more pods. If you plan on making a sauce and want to process all your pods at once, just pop the ripe ones into the freezer as you pick them. At the end of the season, you should have a nice batch to work with. If you're going to dry them, dry them as you pick them. Enjoy.

 

[Marturo]

I pick pods when they become fully ripe & save seed from only perfect pods.