should I remove flower buds on newly planted pepper plants?

Greyhound_Gourmet

Greyhound_Gourmet

hi, I finally got my peppers in last Friday (the weather here has been atrocious and hardening off was nearly impossible :( ) -- some of my plants are showing little flower buds but the plants are only 4"-5" tall.  
 
should I remove the flower buds or leave them?  Thinking I should, so the plant can concentrate on growing taller, but not sure.
 
TIA!
 
Keep the plant growing properly, and it's really not going to make that much of a difference at all.  It's an oft asked question, but a perennial non-issue.  Do whatever you like with it.  You won't notice a significant difference at the end of the season, either way.
 
I agree with Solid7's advice; while I understand the theory that, by impeding the blooming, the plant will "focus" its energy on growth, this doesn't seem to be how it works with chile plants. I suspect that this is an actual thing with other plants, and I guess some growers have generalized it as a good practice for peppers. Based on my own experiments with Jalapeños and what I've read on THP a million times, it's not going to make a difference in the rate of growth, nor in the plants' eventual size.

My whole philosophy, mostly bc I'm incredibly impatient, is that I don't wanna miss out on those early pods anyway. Those are kinda like the most exciting part of the season, especially for new-to-me varieties.
 
I snipped off the first flower on one of my shishito plants, but it simply started making a new one right next to where it was not long after.
 
Snipping off that one had the exact same result, so I decided to just let it have its way.
 
There are a few ways of looking at this.
 
First of all, if a pepper thinks that it is supposed to flower then it will flower. It needs to be convinced with the right combination of nutrients. Amount of light really does not matter - peppers will flower in 12 hour light just as well as they will in 24 hour light.
 
If you want your plants to grow huge first and not produce flowers yet, then feed them an excess of nitrogen. It's really that simple with hydroponics because nutrients have immediate effect.
 
If you are growing in dirt, you need to take into account that even if you change the feeding mix the dirt will have already buffered nutrients and it will take time for the plant to deplete them. In other words, it will keep growing new flower buds for some time even though you switch to nitrogen heavy feeding.
 
Why would you want to prevent fruiting when the plant will still grow at the same time? Simple - the plant grows faster without fruits than it does with fruits. If you are in a place with a short growing season then getting the plant to ramp up size first means that when it finally produces fruits it will produce a shitload all at once. That means that you probably don't need to carry the plant inside the house for the last month while ripening finishes. If you have a plant that is growing and fruiting at the same time, it just takes longer - which is fine if you have a greenhouse or inside space.
 
You cannot influence your plant to flower by selectively adding nutrients, unless you do it by way of deficiency. In which case, it's completely counterproductive.
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Flowering and fruiting is determined by hormones, environmental conditions, and/or plant stressors.
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You won't prevent fruits by using high N ferts. You might dessicate the roots. But a plant's access to any and all nutrients is universal. If it needs it, it will take it. If it doesn't, it won't. Roots have ionic receptors which only hold a specific nutrient, and only up to it's limit. Overloading some nutrients, while denying others, just puts you in the deficiency zone. It's silly to try to influence a pepper plant through nutrient manipulation. Much better to just let it grow in as ideal if conditions as one can provide. This is far more important than NPK ratios.
 
If one doesn't believe in the supreme influence of environment over NPK ratios, I invite you to come see the difference in how my plants grow, from February to May, when the temps are cooler, and humidity is low, vs June through October, when the temps get hot, humidity gets high, and difference in night vs day temps are much less. I don't change my nutrients, but the early growth is phenomenal. Later growth is less impressive, and at times, almost just maintenance.
 
My second wife would always remove flowers on small young plants, said it was a must. I never could understand it and never did it to my plants. And we both agreed finally that it didn't seem to make any difference at all on her plants compared to mine. And there wasn't a lot we agreed on... lol.
 
 
The collective knowledge and opinions on threads like this are an amazing resource...
I've learned so much in the short time I've been a forum member.
 
I thank all the pepper gurus and capsaicin ninjas we are blessed with on these forums.
 
solid7 said:
If one doesn't believe in the supreme influence of environment over NPK ratios, I invite you to come see the difference in how my plants grow, from February to May, when the temps are cooler, and humidity is low, vs June through October, when the temps get hot, humidity gets high, and difference in night vs day temps are much less. I don't change my nutrients, but the early growth is phenomenal. Later growth is less impressive, and at times, almost just maintenance.
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Address?
 
i have never removed buds from my plants but i have harvested pods that are still green in the belief that it will cause the plant to produce more pods. i've done this with jalapeno, poblano, cowhorn, fresno and serrano. these can be used green or red so its ok. if i waited till everything ripens to red it would push any harvest back a month or more. most peppers are best when fully ripe though.  
 
skullbiker said:
Address?
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PM me, I'm sure we can work something out.
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Are you - as a knowledgeable grower - actually suggesting that you don't believe that environmental factors are more definitive than shifting NPK values?
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By all means, don't just drive by - let's have an actual conversation - this is a discussion board, after all. 
 
solid7 said:
Are you - as a knowledgeable grower - actually suggesting that you don't believe that environmental factors are more definitive than shifting NPK values?
 
By all means, don't just drive by - let's have an actual conversation - this is a discussion board, after all. 
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When smart people disagree and actually discuss it, the rest of us win, too!  :cool:
 
willard3 said:
Leave the chile alone, it knows what to do better than you do.
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Ever since I adopted this as my guiding philosophy, my results have been much improved. As I see it, if the chile plant is struggling, showing symptoms of a problem, it might be asking me for help with some sort of issue (pests, nutrients, environmental factors)...But if the chile plant is producing flowers and setting pods, growing, thriving to any extent....I take that as the plant's way of telling me to mind my own business.

If it ain't broke, don't try to fix it.
 
Bicycle808 said:
Ever since I adopted this as my guiding philosophy, my results have been much improved. As I see it, if the chile plant is struggling, showing symptoms of a problem, it might be asking me for help with some sort of issue (pests, nutrients, environmental factors)...But if the chile plant is producing flowers and setting pods, growing, thriving to any extent....I take that as the plant's way of telling me to mind my own business.

If it ain't broke, don't try to fix it.
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Very true.  If more people understood this, the dialogue on this board would be reduced by probably 2/3.
 
solid7 said:
 
Very true.  If more people understood this, the dialogue on this board would be reduced by probably 2/3.
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I guess it's a double-edged sword. . . We'd all be better off, as growers, but I'd have less chile-related stuff to read while bored at work. And THP has been sleepy enough this year, already.
 
solid7 said:
 
Very true.  If more people understood this, the dialogue on this board would be reduced by probably 2/3.
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Hey, take it easy on us pepper peons, we are just trying to learn our way out of the 'mud mix.... lol
 
acs1 said:
 
Hey, take it easy on us pepper peons, we are just trying to learn our way out of the 'mud mix.... lol
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Of course, I get it.  It's a process.  That's why I opt not to offer the "search is your friend" advice. ;)
 
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