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My Peter is Wilted, Flacid, Wrinkled, and Discolored.

LunchBox

LunchBox

Knowing you pervs...that got your attention...lol

I'm pot-growing a few Peter-Peppers, and he buds are all wilting away.

Here's the specs:

They stay outside, full sun, 70-100 degrees, watered 2x a day, in 1g pots. I transplanted them almost 2 weeks ago from their nursery pots, into a mix of sandy-loam and dried horse poo. I'm hoping it's the worst of the "shock" of the roots busting into new soil. Any ideas?

Thanks!

peterpepper1.jpg


peterpepper2.jpg
 
There's water pooling at the top of that pot.

I'm going to guess poor drainage and low oxygen to the roots.

Not that it's the only drainage aid, but i don't see any perlite in there either.
 
In my opinion the sandy loam and horse manure is the problem. I am not a good container gardener so you want help from Potawie, PRF, AJ, etc. but that combination by itself sounds too heavy for a potting mix. There appears to be standing water in your pot.

If you are concerned about making your own mix you can always just add perlite to Miracle Gro potting mix. It might not give you huge plants like some of the other members but it will get the job done. It also isn't hard to find. Home Depot, Lowes, etc. carry both. Good luck and stick with it. Container gardening has numerous advantages but I just cannot seem to get everything dialed in. I prefer growing in raised beds.
 
The soil in that first picture looks like a soupy mess.... If you are watering like that twice a day I think it will be an over watering issue if anything.

-J
 
Cold water can do that. I agree with the others about the watering. I have a three raised beds for which I hauled in dirt from a landscape supply for one of them that was called a "growers mix" that contained Horse manure and much sand. The peppers in that bed are tolerating the soil but the tomato's which are growing large, truly look like something from Dr Suess meets Tim Burton's nightmare. My recycled dirt from last season is doing far better.

Good Luck Mike
 
Thanks...the water is only pooled because I just watered it, set the pitcher down, then took a pic. The water is also lukewarm...usually I fill it, leave it outside, then water later.

I water morning and evening...both times, the tops are dusty, and dry.
 
I would definitely say that is 100% to do with your soil mix.

1. It obviously is not porous enough starving the roots of oxygen and creating issues with drainage
and also likely to affect the availability of nutrients to the plant.

2. Was the horse manure well worked into the medium to somewhat dilute it?? (If that makes sense) When using raw animal manure you can tend to get 'hot spots' of to much nutrients within the soil which will actually burn the plants roots and cause eventual death.

3.I would carefully free the root ball from the current soil and let it sit in a bucket of fresh (non-chlorinated) water for an hour and get another pot with good drainage holes and fill it with a well balanced and well draining sterilised soil mix (store brought if necessary and you can add vermiculite to this if you are worried about drainage still.

4. Re-pot the plant into the other pot with the fresh medium and only water it with fresh water when it needs it (not on a schedule until you know your plants a little better) for the first week after re-potting.

5. You can also give it a light foliar feed with a weak solution of seaweed/kelp extract to try to to get some nutrients directly into the leaves while the plant's roots settles in.

6. After that slowly introduce some seaweed/kelp solution to the watering for the next week (albeit a 1/2 strength dose) and I think your should see a fast recovery.

Someone else may feel I am way off the mark but that's what I would do
 
I have 2 suggestions:

If you want to keep the mix to see how it works, take care of the drainage issue. Carefully take the plant out of the bucket and put the soil mix in another bucket. Make sure there are holes (cut some if necessary) in the bottom of the container and then put some small rocks in the bottom. Then, put the plant and your mix back in.


I can't see from the pic, how many containers you have, but you state you are growing a few. You look like you have a normal garden. Try growing 1 pepper plant with your ground soil. Remove the pot any you custom mix from one of the containers. Follow my earlier suggestion regarding the drainage. Get a shovel and dig up enough soil from the ground, being careful to not include grass, weeds or roots. Put the soil in the container. Wash the root ball with a spray container filled with water. Re pot in the new container. Water the plant. Wait 3 or 4 waterings before fertilizing to let the roots soak up any nutrients present in the ground soil. When you start fertilizing, don't use more than a 50% solution.

Good luck - post the results.
 
I think the drainage issue may be a bit overblown...maybe! The sandy loam drains well, and the pots have drainage holes in the bottom. The horse-poo was well decomposed, dried, and mixed well with the soil...probably at a poo:soil/1:4 ratio.

But back to the issue...why would the plants look good...and the blooms look like piss?
 
Not great with soil issues myself.. But if you are watering twice a day I think a big part of this is a water issue. I water like twice a week!! Also, are you watering just the soil or the whole plant? If the whole plant, water is getting trapped in the blooms and causing the bloom problems. With watering twice a day the blooms never get a chance to dry. I would cut back on the watering and see if that helps.
 
Your mix is way too hot for your weiner pods. Get it outta there and switch to a larger pot and some (ANY!) potting mix. In my experience, the peters aren't terribly needy and too much fertlizer will stress the crap out of them. If you can keep it in shade during the worst part of the day, you shouldn't need to water it more than once a day. From there it should produce just fine as long as it's cool enough to let the pods set.
 
I'm thinking it may be a "heat" related issue too. Either the mix is too hot (as EOF suggested) or possibly, if you have the plant out in the sun all day, the pot may be heating up too much.

One thing I learned very quickly is that pepper plants don't like burning feet (roots) - it causes them to die. ;)
 
Lunchbox,
I'm going to chime in and say that the plant is drowning. Pepper plants prefer to have their roots dry, to a point. Also keep in mind that even though the top of the dirt may be dry and crusty, there is another 6 inches or so of moist dirt. What you are looking to achieve is an even mix of oxygen and available water for the roots. If there is too much water, which I suspect you have, the pore space within your soil fills up and the roots drown.

Do a search and read up on evapotranspiration. It is the combination of evaporation ( water loss from the soil) and transpiration (which is basically what the plant uses).

For my own plants which I am growing in 3 gallon containers, I am watering about every other day. Each plant is getting on average 1/2 - 3/4 gallon. I do have a few plants that are getting into heavy production now and are needing more water each day than what im giving everyone else.

Edit: I wanted to add in that my plants are in full sun from about 7am until 6pm with temps averaging 95 during the day. The soil in the pots do get dry on top but the root zone is staying moist.

Cliff notes: don't water it for a few days.
 
You're watering 2x a day??? I have plants 4x that big that I water at most 3 times a week and it has been hotter than phone sex with a blind chick the last couple weeks. :eek:
 
Don't go by how dry the top of the mix is. Less than an inch down it could be soaking wet still. It looks like you are overwatering it to me too. I say you need a different mix, one that drains better.
 
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