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What sizes of containers are you using to grow your monster pepper plants?

cycadjungle

cycadjungle

Instead of messing up someone else's thread, I thought I would start this one. Someone had asked which plants are producing the most peppers and we heard about single plants producing 7 to 10 pounds of peppers in a year. I had also asked about whether people stake their plants up or not. So,
What size containers are you using to make these huge plants? I am growing most of my plants in 7 gallon containers, which are 12 inches by 12 inches. They are growing some fairly large plants that seem to be maxing about 5+ feet tall by about 4 to 5 feet wide in a single season (from seed that same year) Now, I am finding that I will be growing these plants for several years and know, at some point in time, I will need to step them up into something larger. I can root crop the plants and repot them each year with new soil, but still, I can see taking some of the older plants and putting them in at least 15s at some point in time. I'm getting older and it is getting harder to move 25s around like I used to, but I would bet I could get some monster plants using 25s, at least for a few just to try it out.
On staking the plants, I see that I have needed to stake up some new plants just to support the new, softer stems, but also have found that the second year plants don't need staking any more. Tom
 
I dont use pots very much so i cant address your first question,
but as far as staking.. yes i always do, I typically have used heavy gage hog wire
http://www.alibaba.com/product-gs/514684139/hog_wire_fence.html ,
this is useful because you can create a large circular cage for the plant to grow up thru. The circular cage will stand up on its own so it should work well around pots.
Early on in the growth cycle i secure some small wooden sticks thru the cage that will support the plant till it gets big enough.
the holes in the metal allow you to pick any pods that grows inside the cage area as well
but i have also tried bamboo stakes this last year and it worked well too but need to be secured in the ground to be effective.

just my 2 cent.. i hope that helps..
steven
 
Last year was my first year really growing peppers and I made the mistake of using straight topsoil in 5 gallon dry wall buckets. I like the buckets, but this year with a much better soil mix I should have much larger pepper plants.
 
One 83 Gal pot , and 150 10 Gal Pots ist the normal size I use.
This year I will try some 180 Gal Bags but will plant between 2 and 4 Plants per Bag
 
Hombre said:
One 83 Gal pot , and 150 10 Gal Pots ist the normal size I use.
This year I will try some 180 Gal Bags but will plant between 2 and 4 Plants per Bag
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Geez that would cost a fortune to fill if using potting soil ... I am assuming you have free or extremely cheap access to soil??
 
I put all of my plants in the ground last year. Most all of my plants were 5 - 7 foot tall. I had just over 65 plants by season’s end. This year most all my plants will be in the ground but I plan to use 5 gallon buckets and Walmart bags to occupy an unused space behind my property. If I trusted the soil I would have those in the ground as well. Looking forward however to being able to move container plants if we get severe storms like years past. I lost about 25% of my plants due to damaging winds and rains on several back to back storms.
 
Check out your local landscaping companies, if they're not burlap wrapping their shrubs, usually they will part with used 12, 15, 20 gal containers.

True story.....I live on the South side of the city, one block from the burbs. Theres numerous cemeteries near buy. On the way home from work a few weeks ago I was taking the back road and saw a landscaping crew planting "Arborvitaes". I noticed many larger nursey containers in their truck. So what the heck I turned back to seek my claim...They let me take all they had. 15 gallon containers...35 or so total. It only cost me lunch. Needless to say they weren't eating "Hot Dogs and Fries"...I took care of them and also gave them my contact ...just incase they "dig up" some more.
 
Trippa said:
Geez that would cost a fortune to fill if using potting soil ... I am assuming you have free or extremely cheap access to soil??
Click to expand...

I mix my Soil myself bought 22 Tonns of Compost a few years back and mix it with my Topsoil out of the garden. Every other year I test some potting Soil they later get mixed into withe the others as well. 2/3 of the Old Soil gets mixed up with new Compost and the other 1/3 goes onto the Compost and is used then 2 years later
 
I use 1/2 gal. Containers and my plants get about 8 ft tall.

Now who would believe that.....

Last year I use 16 gal containers and my plants were about 3.5 to 4 foot tall. (I had troubles early in the year or I believe they wouldn't have had a problem hitting 5+ feet) the trunks are about 1.5" thick. (OW them now) I had a few plants do ok in 5gal buckets.

Most of my plants are in ground but I always have a slew of containers (whatever I have available; 1/2 gal. Mostly) laying around with various plants I wanted to try out...I just let those do what they do, not much care given to them. This year I've got some ideas though.
 
Thanks everyone. I figured I could go to at least 15 gallon containers and would probably get some hefty plants. I knew that once they outgrew the 7s, they would have to go to 15s sooner or later, and that way, I could work in some new soil. I'm going to try a few in 25s this year, just for kicks, and see how much bigger some may get. I have a few nice established plants that might be perfect to go right into 25s. Luckily with a nursery, I have plenty of pots in all sizes and I get my potting soil mixed to my own specifications and order in 30 yards at a time.This gives me an idea on what I want to play with. Tom
 
I usually do in ground, but last year I had so many problems, so this year I will be using 25- 5 gallon Buckets a long with one 35 gallon tub. The 35 gallon tub will be used for the pepper grow out challenge, I will be using the best soil mix I can afford which won't be a lot, but I have a free source for composted Cow manure, rotted hay and rotted cattle feed which I can amend with Blood and Bone Meal and I know where I can get a bucket load of red worms, so I'm happy with that. I may not win the contest but I'll give them a run for their money.
 
wildseed57 said:
I usually do in ground, but last year I had so many problems, so this year I will be using 25- 5 gallon Buckets a long with one 35 gallon tub. The 35 gallon tub will be used for the pepper grow out challenge, I will be using the best soil mix I can afford which won't be a lot, but I have a free source for composted Cow manure, rotted hay and rotted cattle feed which I can amend with Blood and Bone Meal and I know where I can get a bucket load of red worms, so I'm happy with that. I may not win the contest but I'll give them a run for their money.
Click to expand...

I must have missed that one. Was there a post somewhere in which there is a challenge to see how big of a plant you can get for this year/season?
 
i dont know how\why but i get the same resaults from growing in a 10L or 18L pots
so next season i will keep'em in the 10's
 
Dani8538 said:
i dont know how\why but i get the same resaults from growing in a 10L or 18L pots
so next season i will keep'em in the 10's
Click to expand...

Depends on the varieties you are growing I guess but some of the chinense would certainly respond favourably to bigger root zones

or rather should respond favourably
 
Last year I used 20 liter pots and my Scorpions grew about 1,6 - 1,7m tall and 1,4 - 1,5m wide. The yellow one got too heavy with all the pods and broke in half. The entire middle stem broke
 
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