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yield Why does 1 plant have 40+ peppers and the one next to it 0?

M

Mumbles

I'm curious if there would be any specific reason why one of my ghost pepper plants would have 40+ peppers on it and the one right next to it has 0? They are in the same raised bed so soil and water would be the same for both of them.
 
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How about flowers? Did both plants flower the same time?
I have a similar situation with one plant in the row with no pods showing. It does have flowers though.
I'm wondering if it's possible for a plant to be sterile.
 
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mcbob said:
How about flowers? Did both plants flower the same time?
I have a similar situation with one plant in the row with no pods showing. It does have flowers though.
I'm wondering if it's possible for a plant to be sterile.
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Both plants have had flowers at the same time and I've even been trying to manually pollinate flowers as I see them as well. I've got a few pods on other plants but the one plant just seems to be doing so much better which seems strange to me.
 
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Mumbles said:
I'm curious if there would be any specific reason why one of my ghost pepper plants would have 40+ peppers on it and the one right next to it has 0? They are in the same raised bed so soil and water would be the same for both of them.
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I totally feel you here. I laid down 4 railroad ties in a square in the yard. (Full sun spot) I then proceeded to fill the square with about 70% topsoil and 30% cow manure. (I did this to save cost. Cow manure is expensive - the topsoil was not)

Anyway, I mixed it all together. Raked it back and forth. Got a good mixture of the stuff and then I planted tomatoes, (cherry), Habaneros, and Sweet Banana peppers. The cherry tomatoes took off lovely and is still producing fruit. To be frank, I lost control of those plants quickly they grew so good. The Habaneros are growing some of the most beautiful Habs I have ever seen. They are *HUGE* fruit / almost the size of my palm. The heat is with them too. Lol.

Now to the banana peppers ~ They were planted in the first row (nearest to the sun so no shade from other plants) , they were planted in the same soil and they grew absolutely atrociously. They looked sick this whole season and never did produce any quality fruit. I got maybe 4 good peppers off of them but they were small. The plants looked sick all summer. I finally ripped them up last week but the Habs look like they are growing in heaven.

I don't get it...... shrugs. Didn't meant to hijack your thread, I'm just saying, I feel your pain and confusion.
 
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I have 2 reapers in pots that are doing the same thing. Both produced a little bit then both bushed up a lot. One has about 20 fruit the other has 4 both flowered at same time. The "slow" one is now flowering about 3 to 1 so hold on and wait to see if at the end they catch up.
 
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HellfireFarm said:
My peppers are about 1' apart so about as identical conditions as possible, and I have them grow totally different from spot to spot. Never have figured out why...
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Well, at least I'm not the only one. The thing that drives me crazy is that I anticipated a few plant "losses" so I compensated by planting 5 in each row.

1st row nearest to the sun with no other shade interruption = 5x sweet banana plants and not one of them ever looked healthy the entire growing season. I suppose one could argue maybe they got too much sun / heat but I live in Western NC and temps struggle to get above 90 where I am. Not only that, but the Habaneros in the row behind the sweet banana's quickly outgrew everything but didn't shade anything else.

Put it this way, I'm a humble guy. Not a professional pepper grower but I'd literally put my Habs up against anybody or any company in the world. Period. (This season. Right now) They are that beautiful and I am amazed at how well they did this season. I did learn that next season I probably only need to plant 2 though, not 5. Lol. It's a bit crowded in there. But 2 frees up space for at least 2 other varieties of peppers that I'd like to try. (5) is definitely too many. (I learned)
 
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Mumbles said:
I'm curious if there would be any specific reason why one of my ghost pepper plants would have 40+ peppers on it and the one right next to it has 0? They are in the same raised bed so soil and water would be the same for both of them.
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This happened to me last year with the Carolina Reaper: One plant produced about 15 pods. The other plant 0 pods.
This year the same with BOC: One plant has almost 20 green pods hanging... I removed the other after 3 failed flowering rounds. I saw that in plants that do not produce pods, the flowers do not fully open and the stamens are stuck together. They also have a greenish sheen to their color.
I also vote for the possibility of sterile plants.
 
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SpainChillihead said:
This happened to me last year with the Carolina Reaper: One plant produced about 15 pods. The other plant 0 pods.
This year the same with BOC: One plant has almost 20 green pods hanging... I removed the other after 3 failed flowering rounds. I saw that in plants that do not produce pods, the flowers do not fully open and the stamens are stuck together. They also have a greenish sheen to their color.
I also vote for the possibility of sterile plants.
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Just throwing this out there ~ I talked to "Mike" at Puckerbutt (Home of the Reaper) and he explained one year he got a bunch of flowers but few, if any, pods. He said he happened to mention it to Ed and Ed told him to use "Tomato Set" fertilizer. He said he took the advice and it's made all the difference.

He also dropped this knowledge nugget on me. They don't recommend any fert over 10-10-10. He told me point blank you could use 20-20-20 but all that would do is make the Reaper hotter, but it wouldn't taste as good. So if pure "heat" is your plan, there's that. 20-20-20.

I kind of laughed at that in my head because after about 10 seconds you're not really tasting anything anyway, IMHO and in my experience. Lol
Oh, he also said all things being equal, the average Reaper plant should produce between 3 and 5 lbs of pods. FWIW.
 
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