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I need some major advice, Help!

Phearis

Phearis

I planted these back in January and they grew until about May and just stopped. Like someone put them in a suspended time bubble until 3 weeks ago, they then quadrupled in size and are sprouting flowers everywhere. Here's my problem, the first frost is in 2 to 3 weeks, I'll have peppers out the wazzoo in about 3 months but that put it in the middle of December, not prime pepper weather. Soooooo, what do I do?

DSCN1721.jpg
 
I had the same thing happen too, my pumpkin decided to all of a sudden get lots of flowers, too late for that, it produced nothing this year.
The Only thing to do is bring it inside with good lights. We had at least 3 cold spells and brought the pots in, another one in a day or two :(
 
It seems like what you are saying is that it stopped growing during the summer months.  The pics are outside, if you had them out during the summer were they getting enough light?  I have a Thai dragon that didnt do anything all summer and now that the sun travels lower through the sky I think its getting more light and it's taking off.  They also don't like it too hot though that doesn't usually effect growth only flower set.  All you can do is bring em in.
 
Even if the plants were on the north facing side of the house they will still grow and produce pods from the ambient light they receive. They will however do much better in the open with partial shading during the mid days heat spell. I am leaning toward some kind of nutrient lockout that has run its course and now the plant is able to uptake neuts. Deformed leaves and burns present may be telltale to a problem.
 
We had an insanely hot and dry Summer in Washington, record breaking in fact. The spots and deformed leaves are due to my upstairs neighbor washing her patio with PineSol about 2 months ago and getting a couple dozen drips but doesn't seem to have effected the plants otherwise. And being in an apartment, I don't really have any other place I can put them outside to get more light. However, you bring up an interesting point I hadn't considered, do plants get sick like people? And it just took 4 months to get over it.
 
Generally speaking, chile plants like at least 6 hours of direct sunlight each day. The caveat is that in excessive heat, a bit of shade is a good thing. However, in looking at your local temperature history for the past summer, your definition of "insanely hot and dry" comes nowhere near conditions closer to the equator, which is where most chiles originate. In other words, you live in an area where you could keep them (adult plants) out in the sun all day. So yes, if your your porch/balcony is pretty much shaded for most of the summer, the plants won't grow very much and, as stated above, will take off when the sun shifts so that they get more light.
 
Plenty of people bring their plants indoors for the winter; I have had chile plants that lasted 4 years this way. (And only 4 years because I decided to stop bringing them in. Hey, I need a break sometimes, too!) They key with bringing them indoors depends upon what you want. If you just want the pods that are on them to ripen up, they need warmth, as much light as possible, and food/water. A sunny window works for this, but if you have grow lights, all the better. If you want them to keep producing over the winter, you will definitely need a bunch of artificial light hitting them unless you have an uber-sunny window. If you want them to go dormant, however, and just have that bit of head start on next year's grow, you can trim the branches and roots, keep them fairly cool, don't give them much light, and feed/water less often. 
 
Do plants get sick like people? In a manner of speaking, yes. Below is a link to a site that has crop disease guides that are pretty good. The PDF at the bottom of the page I linked you to is more helpful than the online versions, as the PDF has pictures. Keep in mind, though, that the pictures are mostly end-stage of each disease - sometimes the early stages appear differently. For example, in early blossom-end-rot (BER) the pod walls become soft, almost watery. It's not until/unless you let it go further that the symptoms in the pics show up. You can prevent BER (or even stop its progression if caught early) by giving your plants calcium and magnesium.
http://www.seminis-us.com/resources/disease-guides/
 
Yup. Bring them in, give them light, an be ready for bugs. My SB7J did the same. Paused during the dry heat, flowering now the temps swing out of the narrow August range of damned hot in the day and really hot at night.
 
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