annuum my brothers jalapeno plant

SavinaRed

SavinaRed

A month ago I gave my brother a few plants that I had extras of for his garden. I gave him a jalapeno, bishops, choc hab, carrib red and jays peach.
 
Yesterday I was over and he had some of the jalapenos that he picked a few days ago with the brown stress lines on them. Now I munch on jalapenos all the time at my house and never sweat, hick up , feel the need to drink milk or anything else. My brother has a higher tolerance for heat than I do and told me these were pretty hot for a jal. I kind of snickered at him like ( ya right I'm growing the same ones) and never felt they had much heat.
 
Boy was I wrong ! I got lit up from a dang jalapeno for the first time in my life. It was hotter than any serranos that I've eaten or grown. 
 
He had a ripe red one that I saved the seeds from so that I can grow them next season.
 
Why are his so hot and mine are not ? Genetics, growing conditions, a freak of a plant ?
 
I've had the same thing happen to me with plants I've given to my Dad. I had the exact same seedlings and gave him a few spares I had. He grew in pots and I grew mine in my garden.
 
His were far hotter, I think it's in the plants genetics to make itself hotter when growing conditions aren't ideal to minimize the peppers edibility by maximizing the heat. This increases chances of reproduction by the plant.
 
 
SR
 
I mean I doubt this is it but I had some jalapenos on the side of the house I would forget to water and would wilt all the time. The others were always in my sight and being taken care of. When both were ripe the one I half added was so damn hot I mean easily twice as hot as the others.

Maybe the stress?
 
Shorerider said:
Yes, the more stress the plant is under, the hotter it will make the pods to ensure future generations.
SR.
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You are absolutely right Shorerider by stressing the plant tests have shown that heat levels rise - the UK's last year's Superhot "Katie" was subjected to branch/leaf removal .... periods of denying the plant water and in some publications verbal abuse was shouted at the plant ... I would take the last one with a pinch of salt however in nature the plant is trying to protect itself ... if predators attack the plant the only defence it has is to produce hotter fruit in an attempt to be less favourable and hopefully the predator will go elsewhere
 
Hot Mama Bearz said:
Time for Mama Bearz to stop babying those wimps.  They look a little too happy if you ask me,  I yelled at mine today, told them they were a bunch of pansy's.  Also told them that they were all gonna die come November,  Think that was enough stress?
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Maybe. But there's always gonna be that one pepper that goes off all half cocked...

"SEE! I TOLD YOU I COULD BECOME ANYTHING I WANTED AND NOW IM A BEAUTIFUL PANSY!"
 
Hot Mama Bearz said:
Time for Mama Bearz to stop babying those wimps.  They look a little too happy if you ask me,  I yelled at mine today, told them they were a bunch of pansy's.  Also told them that they were all gonna die come November,  Think that was enough stress?
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I told my reaper last year I was gonna throw it out if it didn't start fruiting soon, because I got nothing from it the year before and decided that it might have been because it was growing slowly. Then it proceeded to outproduce everything put together but a giant 7 pod and a much older habanero. Even my friend's dorset naga didn't fruit as much.
 
My jalapeno story is one from last year I had in a pot had survived the winter but looked like shit. I told the fiancée when we were planting our garden this year to just throw it out it wouldn't survive. She loves to rehab life-support plants so she made a place for it in the garden anyway. The garden was getting full sun for quite awhile until I put up shade cloth, however the plants would wilt then get watered and bounce back every day. The jalapeno plant produced very early with the head start, produced tons more pods than it did last year, and when I let the ripen were hotter than they were last year.
 
So I have to agree with the others, the stress to this plant has made it one hell of a producer and much hotter than the nurtured and babied peppers.
 
Still not hot enough.... Tomorrow I bring out the weed wacker and rev it within close range. Maybe even give them a little nip as a reminder. Muh wah wah wah.....
 
I have had jalapenos in the past that were exactly as you described. Blistering hot to the point you look at the remaining piece of pod in your hand to assure yourself you didn't grab a super hot by mistake. And yes,
stressing of the annuums does increase heat. I started a thread sometime back posing the question of stressing plants to increase capsaicin production in the pods. Apparently this does not hold true the hotter the pepper naturally is.
 
 
http://thehotpepper.com/topic/52579-stressing-for-heat/
 
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