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How to trim back a frost damaged plant?

HwyBill

HwyBill

Banned
Had a nice, adult plant that was actively producing fruit (still has hangers). I was out of the country for 3 months, and it got pretty neglected. It was still in a pot, and I left my faithful caretakers in charge of about 150 other plants that were in the ground.

Now that I am home, and it is in a pot, I decided I'd try to over-winter it. Not looking to induce dormancy, or otherwise cut it back any more than I have to. Since it will be inside, under careful temp, wind, and humidity attention, I'd prefer to just leave it growing/producing for as long as possible.

It obviously got some considerable damage (lost most leaves, many branches died) due to several exposures to sub-frost nights in my region. Now that it is inside and under control, it is exhibiting new growth and being otherwise healthy... I just want to decide what to do with the dead branches. See picture:

Ii40Y.jpg


How should I trim these dead branches?

1) Leave them alone
2) Cut them off at the node
3) Cut them off higher up
4) Other, please explain since I'm new
 
You don't need to do anything. The plant will abort the damaged areas, except that if there is a lot of moisture and they get gooey, that should be cut off so it doesn't spread. However if there were dead leaves still., removing them would provide a short term benefit of more sun to the rest of the plant that might be shaded by those, but it isn't a factor in what you have pictured.

Regardless of this. for esthetic reasons you can clip off any browned areas, they are dead and serve no useful purpose but overall, unless the dead areas make it too big for the available space indoors, there is no pressing need to do anything.
 
Thank you for your input, Dave. I certainly appreciate your insight.

I like to be a pretty hands-off grower, so I am always biased toward the insight of a grower who suggests I should just leave them alone.

I think it is pretty clear that frost damaged the plant to the point of losing most of its leaves, it was admittedly neglected since I was away from home for 3 months, and many of the branches died. In the same vein, I think you can see that there are still some developing pods in the lower right corner of the pic, and a great deal of new foliage in the bottom center of the pic since I rescued the plant.

It now has all the happy maintenance requirements, so I feel good that it will do well moving forward!
 
Heh - I've never seen a pepper plant abort a damaged branch. Usually they shrivel up and eventually lose their moisture, but just hang on. I say just cut off the affected branches and move on.
 
I cut mine down to a stump and then trim roots and pot down before bringing indoors. If you don't cut it way back then really be on the watch for aphids and other pests that won't have natural predators
 
Yeah the dead branch will stay but it's not doing any harm for it to be there, but it does essentially abort it in that it shuts down water and nutes to it.
 
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