Habanero spotting and defoliation -- help!

B

bckline

Hi everyone,
 
I need a bit of help.
 
I planted three pepper plants at the beginning of this summer (~mid-May), and all three have fallen victim to wilting and leaf spotting at some point during the season. Each has grown quite vigorously for a while, then developed the spots and started dropping leaves rapidly. This has always occurred beginning at the very ends of branches and working backwards. My last healthy plant (a habanero) just began developing the spots about a week ago and it's in the middle of fruiting, so I'd really like to solve this problem if I can.
 
I took some leaves from the previous afflicted plant (a Caribbean Red Hot) to the nursery where I bought the plants, but they didn't know what to make of them -- they indicated that root rot or a pathogenic infection would likely manifest from the bottom up as opposed to from the branch tips inward. I tried all sorts of things to cure the previous plant -- supplementing with CalMag Plus, decreasing watering frequency, supplementing water with H2O2 -- nothing improved the situation. The plant is still alive, but never bore any fruit and is on its last legs. I'd like to avoid having my habanero plant suffer the same fate.
 
I've attached a (large) picture in hopes that someone will be able to positively identify my problem. Thanks very much in advance!
 
mKKTYK9.jpg
 
Thanks for the fast reply!
 
Per a recommendation from the nursery since the second plant took a turn for the worse, I've been flushing the pots pretty thoroughly (watering until a good bit comes out the bottom), supplementing with a low dose of MaxSea 16-16-16 (1 tsp per gallon) every watering or every other watering. I water around once every 5ish days -- the plants only get morning sun due to restrictions of my apartment, so the soil doesn't dry out very quickly.
 
As I said above, this plant was absolutely flourishing until about a week ago, when it started developing spotty / wilty leaves and dropping leaves all of a sudden. The same was true of the Red Hot. It was kickin' a** and taking names, then all of a sudden everything went south.
 
i would be careful how much water your giving it for sure thats the main problem but you have another, your leaves tell me from how dark green they are that the nitogen is a a bit too high in that MAXSEA,i see flowers so maybe this isnt the proper dianosis, anyway its ok in the beginning to promote growth but not when the plant is maturing, if you give it too much nitrogen when its mature it will get huge and leafy but will be very slow to give you pods
 
as the palnt starts to flower cut way back on nirogen or even stop or the flowers will be slow in coming or even drop if you fert while it is flowering
 
it is said you should stay below 6 percent nitrogen when the plant is mature
as it stand dont fertilize again unless you run into a problem
i hope this helps
 
thanks your friend Joe
 
Yeah I to recall very dark leaves being too much of something in the soil and as suggested above, its the nitrogen.
 
Aha, that's good to know! The leaves aren't QUITE as vibrant as they appear in the photo (my phone's camera has a tendency to oversaturate colors), but since the plant is flowering I'll cut way back on the nitrogen as you suggest. Would you say I should reduce watering further? Most people seem to say that it's good to wait to water until the top ~inch of soil is dry, but is there a better metric? I frequently come out in the bright mid-morning sun to find the leaves somewhat droopy. I'm not sure if this is a normal reaction to the day's first sun or if it's an indication of underwatering, but it sure makes me WANT to water.
 
Alrighty, I'll try to restrain myself. How far down into the pots should be dry before I water? The pots I'm using are broad planter pots, but are only around a foot deep (or less).
 
For me I water once a day. I planted two plants in bigger pots yesterday and gave them a really good watering in until the water came through the drains. It is my first year on pepper growing but with all other plants, I tend to water once a day and try to keep that in the morning. If they don't look like they need watering, I'll delay it a little while it sits in the sun or ill just give it a quick misting. Mind you , I don't use a watering can or anything, I use one of those hair salon misters to water my plants so at most they get about 50ml a day, give or take. The little tab on the plants I bought from a shop suggest they need moderate watering, take that as you may.
 
Usually the surface will dry up quickly but when you brush away some surface soil, you will quickly see its moist underneath. My main problem is overwatering. I do believe overwatering is worse than underwatering. You know when you've done both but when you over water you can introduce fungus into the soil and those gnats can start feeding on the roots. When you under water, you don't really introduce anything, but your plant will sag and usually kicks right back up after a quick water.
 
Theres a picture on here I found a few days ago, it suggest darker than usual leaves which are falling could also be a lack of phosphate in the soil.
 
Here's the best way to measure when to water plants in pots. First, let them dry just until the leaves slightly droop - that's the plant telling you it needs water. Then pick the pot up off the floor just a tad, and feel how much it weighs. You want it to be very close to that light before you water again. Then water until the water is freely flowing, then after it drains a bit, pick the pot up again and notice the weight difference. Do that cycle a few times until you're familiar with it, and just get in the habit of picking up the pot(s) every few days to measure the weight. You will get to a point you know when to water just before the leaves start drooping, if you're attentive enough.
 
Don't use anything like "an inch below....." - those are very unreliable. Also, know that different plants uptake water at different rates. One plant being in need of water does not make all of them so. Let each plant tell you individually when they want to be watered.
 
And yes, wrong ferts for peppers. Peppers are related to tomatoes and have similar nutrient needs. Get a fertilizer that's made for tomatoes and peppers, and you'll be good.
 
Spots on the leaves - - not sure, but I'd recommend you remove the leaves that have that on them at all, being careful not to let them come into contact with other leaves. Bag them and toss in the trash. Better to lose some leaves than the whole plant. 
 
i would be careful how much water your giving it for sure thats the main problem but you have another, your leaves tell me from how dark green they are that the nitogen is a a bit too high in that MAXSEA,i see flowers so maybe this isnt the proper dianosis, anyway its ok in the beginning to promote growth but not when the plant is maturing, if you give it too much nitrogen when its mature it will get huge and leafy but will be very slow to give you pods

as the palnt starts to flower cut way back on nirogen or even stop or the flowers will be slow in coming or even drop if you fert while it is flowering

it is said you should stay below 6 percent nitrogen when the plant is mature
as it stand dont fertilize again unless you run into a problem
i hope this helps

thanks your friend Joe

Good info. I love the search feature here haha.
 
Awesome. Thanks to everyone for all the info. I picked up some copper-based foliar spray fungicide this morning which I'll start applying about once a week to see if I can get rid of the spots, and I'll be careful with the fertilizer (i.e., none for a while) and the watering.
 
I do have a couple of quick follow-up questions. As before, I apologize for by lack of basic knowledge -- this is the first time I've really tried to grow anything hotter than a Serrano, and definitely the first time I've really paid close attention to keeping the plants optimally healthy.
 
1) As I said earlier, it's not unusual for my habanero plant to wilt / droop a bit in the direct sun of the mid- to late morning. Should I take that drooping as a sign that the plant needs watering, or is some amount of droop in direct sunlight normal for these plants?
 
2) Should I continue to fertilize, just with something substantially lower in nitrogen (if I wanted to stick with the MaxSea brand, perhaps their 3-20-20 mix), or stop fertilizing altogether? It seems so counterintuitive to stop feeding the plant when it's actually bearing fruit. For the future, should I start out with something balanced during early growth and switch to low-nitrogen fertilizer when flowering starts, or should I stick with a low-nitrogen fertilizer all the way through?
 
3) Has anyone encountered negative side-effects with copper-based fungicides? Are there any side-effects that I should be aware of or expect to see in advance?
 
Thanks again for all the help and advice.
 
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