Mystery hole - help please

F

FarmAway

G'day from New Zealand

I'm a newbie to both this forum and chilli growing. However, I fell in love with chillies several years ago when I tried a Jamie Oliver pickling recipe, and when we bought a small farm in North Canterbury (north of Christchurch in the South Island of New Zealand), my dream was to start a small business selling home grown pickled and smoked chillies.

Fast forward 9 months and I have my first crop of santiagos, early jalapenos, serranos and cayenne long thin, grown in a 48 metre long tunnel house. I've had a few cock-ups along the way, but I have 100 plants all florishing.

Anyway, quite a few of my chillies have developed mystery holes. It starts as a small white patch which grows until it becomes a hole, then the seeds around the hole turn brown. It doesn't seem to be an insect. I suspect a fungus of some sort, but I've googled mercilessly and can't ID the problem. There is high humidity in the tunnel house as we use a mister for temperature control.

Has anyone seen this before - I'll post a couple of pictures.

Thanks,

Louisa

This is how it starts...


And this is what it ends up like....

 
Are you sure it's not an insect? I don't know what insect pests have made it to New Zealand, but if a neighbor of mine here in the US showed me a pepper like that, I'd be checking for a weevil or a borer.

Let's see, Anthracnose makes larger and multiple spots on peppers, and bacterial spot make lots of small holes. Hmmm, a quick perusal of my pepper diseases field guide doesn't turn up anything either.

I think if I were you, I would put out some insect traps and see if you turn anything up.

Sorry I can't be more helpful.
 
Ah yes, I've seen that one before. It results form one of two things;

A) Catipillers
B) Mold

If it's B, then most likely you have too high of humitity.
 
imaguitargod said:
Ah yes, I've seen that one before. It results form one of two things;

A) Catipillers
B) Mold

If it's B, then most likely you have too high of humitity.
Click to expand...

I agree - something's eating your pods dude! do an autopsy on one and see if there's a fat juicy little caterpillar inside. is there any leaf/stem damage to accompany the 'holey' pods?

welcome to THP! as far as I know you are the first Kiwi - I could be wrong though. there's a couple of Aussies here also.

does it get cold in your neck o' the woods? I'd love to see pics of that polytunnel, what else you got growing in there? get yourself some Naga seeds, you could be the only one in NZ growing/selling them!

cheers bru :cheers:

Mark
 
Welcome Aboard Louisa!
I've had the same problem with my peppers. It's like the insect eats a hole that is a perfect circle, usually only one hole in a pod, then covers the hole with some type of very thin covering while it eats the inside of the pod.
My problem was small grub worms. Fruitworms do the same kind of damage.
 
Thanks to you all for your replies and welcomes ;)

We've looked for bugs inside and outside the pod, but there are no obvious suspects - despite there being a whole eco-system in the tunnel house! There have been some tiny white mites on a couple of the ones with more severe damage, but on most of them there's no sign of insects living on or in the pods.

Sorry my pics aren't very clear - I cleverly focussed on the washing line rather than the chilli. The white stuff is scabby rather than spongey, almost like plant scar tissue. I've sometimes noticed similar patches on squashes and cucumbers, but never so severe that there's a hole.

A friend of mine has taken a couple to show a seed importer friend of his who works for an agri-research company, so I'll post again if I pin the pest down.

Meanwhile, I've taken some pics of the poly tunnel for Chilliman and I'll post my story on the Welcome forum.

Cheers,

Louisa
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top