• Do you need help identifying a 🌶?
    Is your plant suffering from an unknown issue? 🤧
    Then ask in Identification and Diagnosis.

JUST A FEW QUESTIONS.....

U)<now

U)<now

So, I have been growing my peppers and other plants for 3 years now but I am still fairly new to this and have a couple questions for any one willing to help. :lol:. This year I started my plants on February 1st. I started with 288 and give most to family and friends. I had just over a 90% germination rate at a soil temp of around 80 degrees. I only keep about 60 plants for my self.

My questions are: I have heard of a few people pinching the first middle flower bud (or sometimes the first few) off to let the plant grow more foliage before it focuses on growing fruit. I haven't done this in previous years but I am curious. Most of my Sweet peppers usually get up to around 18" high which is around the norm for them in 10" pots but this year I plan to put almost all of my plants, 60, in the Ground. Some of my habs last year were at almost 3ft. in 10" pots and I never pinched any of the first flower buds on them either..... Any thoughts on that would be greatly appreciated.

I also see some plants in pictures on here or on videos on youtube and they look as if they person trimmed off all foliage on the bottom 12-18" of the plant and it looks just bushy on the top..... is there any valid reason for this or just looks????

Here are my two videos for my plants so far this year:

First Video
Second Video
And again.... Any Help or Ideas would be greatly appreciated! :) Thank you ahead of time!
 
A lot of people here do pinch the buds off, right up until they are happy with the size of the plant.
I have never pinched a bud and my plants don't seem to suffer because of it. I want pods as soon as possible!

As for the removal of bottom foliage one reason is to make it harder for bugs/ants to crawl up onto your plant and have their way with it. The other reason is probably because people want the plant to focus on already existing foliage rather than throw little branches out that may never bear fruit before the season ends.
 
Awesome! Thank you for the Info..... I too want Pods as soon as possible as I live in Northern Michigan and Cant put my Plants out till the first part of June normally and then we usually get frost again in late September.
Last year I didn't sow my seeds until April 7th and ended up not having ripe pods till end of July - first part of August. Sooo... This year I started on February 1st and that was a bit early but they will just be nice and big by the time they go out side. :-)
 
I don't bother pinching the flowers, but instead will pinch off any pods that set until the plants are "big" enough. Why just the pods? Well first I don't have a lot of time to pinch off a ton of flowers, second the plant will do the work for you, as most of the flowers will drop anyways, so why waste energy doing what mother nature will do naturally.

As for the lack of foliage on the bottoms, another cause of this is the plants grown under lights don't always get enough light to support the lower leaves, the plant drops them and viola, nice clean looking plant.
 
Another reason to pinch off some of the lower leaves is to give the plant better air circulation. It also helps prevent some disease that might get started because of water splashing on the lower leaves during watering or during a good rain.

I never pinch off any flowers.

Alan
 
Matt Berry said:
I don't bother pinching the flowers, but instead will pinch off any pods that set until the plants are "big" enough. Why just the pods? Well first I don't have a lot of time to pinch off a ton of flowers, second the plant will do the work for you, as most of the flowers will drop anyways, so why waste energy doing what mother nature will do naturally.
Click to expand...

Well that does make sense and I remember my habs having a ton of flower buds last year and most of them did drop and I still got loads of pods... just not till late summer.
 
Mister_Al said:
Another reason to pinch off some of the lower leaves is to give the plant better air circulation. It also helps prevent some disease that might get started because of water splashing on the lower leaves during watering or during a good rain.
Click to expand...

Yeah I did have some problems with Aphids last year once I put my plants out side for the summer. And they always seemed to mostly populate on the lower leaves of the plants so maybe I will try that on a few plants this year.

Any one have any good solutions for getting rid of aphids??? Last year I tried using 1 teaspoon of dish soap to 1 qt water and that seemed like it didn't do anything... I just went through each plant and squished them one by one!! lol

I did purchase some Garden Safe Indoor/Outdoor Home and Garden Insect killer that supposedly kills on contact and is supposed to be safe to use right up to the day of harvest. We will see how it works.
 
Ladybugs are about your best bet, you can wait for them to show up on their own or order a bunch online. With the sprays alternate what you are using for the maximum effectiveness.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top