container Back with more questions (potting, topping, fertilizing, and first bonchi!)

[kizonis]

I'm back after a not-so-good year--aphids messed up some plants, cats messed up others, and weather wasn't ideal.
Out of last year's peppers, the Scotch Bonnet was a great producer, with the Habanero a close second, followed by the Bhut Jolokia (which was surprisingly mild). My Trinidad Scorpion produced ONE pod all season... I heavily pruned all those along with the Habanada and the (low-producing Jalapenos,) treated them for aphids, gave away the rest, and decided to start six new plants this year:

Jalapeno Black Magic
Jalapeno Orange Spice
Madame Jeanette
Carolina Reaper
Chocolate Bhut Jolokia
Aji Mango

Oh, and I also started a Bonchi out of my Tabasco, which was so heavily infected by aphids that it would have probably been binned.

I do have some questions, so hopefully the more experienced growers of this forum can chip in:

Potting
My young plants currently look like this, and I wonder if I should pot them up to 1 gal pots before their final homes (4 and 5 gal pots). I am also not sure if it's time to pot up at all yet. I can barely see some root tails peaking from the container holes of the larger ones. My grow light is not strong (I will be getting a better one for next year) so ideally they should be getting some sunlight, but it may be a bit too early to start the hardening-off process.

Topping
I know people are divided about that, and I would normally lean toward leaving them as they are, but I'm afraid that the Jalapenos and the Aji Mango may get too tall for the windy terrace. On the other hand, I haven't had the best results with topping in the past, so I am not sure what I should do.

Fertilizing
I got some EasySlo from fataliiseeds, which is supposed to be slow-release and last the full season. Has anyone used it? I'll probably start everything on some BioBizz Fish Mix for now (old and new plants) and then switch to EasySlo for the new plants, and use some 20-20-20 for last year's plants. I also have Topmax and BioBloom (BioBizz.) If anyone has experience with any of those and would like to offer some advice, I'm all ears!

Thanks for reading!

 

[kizonis]

Not the most popular post here, it seems, but here's an update:

 

[CaneDog]

Looks like you decided to transition some of them to bigger pots. When's your plant-out date? Seen any new growth yet on the Tabasco bonchi?

 

[kizonis]

I transitioned them to 1 gal pots to make the hardening-off process easier--I just transfer the dog kennel to the yard which has a tiny bit of (weak) sun at a changing angle. I'm now at 4 hours/day, adding one hour daily. I guess I'll transition them to full-sized pots and move to the terrace either this or next Sunday.

Still trying to figure out what to do with fertilizers. With the new plants, it's easier: fish mix (5-1-3) now, Fatalii EasySlo (16-5-24) when I move them to the larger pots.

With last year's plants, I'm leaning toward a mix of fish mix (5-1-3) and bio bloom (2-7-4) for now, since the plants are already flowering. Once everything is on the terrace I will probably swap to a pepper dry fertilizer (7-3-12) that needs monthly application.

As for the bonchi, I wouldn't say that there's any growth on it yet. I'll start using a bit of bonsai fert on it soon, not getting my hopes up until I see something happening.

 

[kizonis]

Looks like you decided to transition some of them to bigger pots. When's your plant-out date? Seen any new growth yet on the Tabasco bonchi?

That's how it looks 25 days after potting it!
It grows at an amazing rate, actually this pic was from 24 hours ago and there has been visible growth since then.