Buckshot said:Thanks for the info and the neon search button especially! Leave it to the defender of the universe to come through... I have several Red Caribbean, bhut jolokia, and jamaican hot plants about 5 feet tall that are planted in the earth and would love to overwinter them. This should be an interesting experiment. I would gladly stress them to ripen the pods but mother nature is watering them for me... where do I send a complaint letter?
millworkman said:I feel for you guys. Hopefully I still have a month and a half to two months left. I better, all my plants are still setting pods.
smariotti said:Do pepper plants make it through the winter outdoors up here in Marin County? We generally never have a hard freeze, though it does get chilly for a while. In that case, can you cut down your plants but leave them in the ground?
Ballzworth said:crazy8:
i'll doing the same thing as you, but we've already had temps here hit -1 and mine are still outside and doing just fine. Low 40s seems warm enough to keep them outside still (are you saying that low 40's is the low overnight temp?). The next time I see temps going to get close to 0C (32F) overnight then I'm bringing them in for good, but at 40F you should be fine for now.
crazy8 said:But if I do pot them and cut off just a little root that will help speed the ripening process correct?
Blister said:The biggest issue for me potting my hab plant was that it wasn't getting full sun. My greenhouse has opaque plastic all around it so the ripening process was very slow. I dug it up, put it in a pot and trimmed back a bunch of branches as well as removed all the flowers. I put it out in direct sunlight whenever possible and it seems to have really helped it along. There are a number of pods starting to turn and hopefully I can get them to full ripe by seasons end.
I haven't decided if I want to overwinter the orange habs this year or not. I like them, but I have about 6 other hab varieties on the grow and I can buy orange habs at the grocery store so I'm kinda torn.