Pepper Questions

[JennieAtkinson]

Hmmmmmmmm.....

I picked my first hot cheyene pepper tonight, admittedly not red, but very orange ........ but not very hot .......... in fact not hot at all.
Is this something to do with the fact that it doesn't get very hot this far north?

Also ..........
I brought my chillis and peppers indoors as it was getting colder and I have been battling with white fly, but I seem to have it under control (no tagetes in the upstairs bedroom - I wonder why not), but the plants are dying and don't look at all perennial

If anybody can throw any light on either of these I'd be very grateful. This is my first year growing peppers and chillis. It took alot of TLC at the beginning of the year, as it was REALLY early for me to be sowing seeds in March, but I didn't think I'd get the fruit if I didn't get a long growing season.

[shirlthegirl43]

The one I overwintered last year lost most of its leaves. I just gave it a little water when it got really dry and left it alone. It looked quite poorly from time to time but perked up in the spring.

Have read that you are supposed to cut it right down to overwinter by I didn't do that. I tend to use the wait and see method with all plants that look dead - they get a good few months to see if they are truly dead (sometimes a fair bit longer) before getting thrown out.

What is it with whitefly this autumn? My Christmas spuds are all covered and they are outdoors!

By the way, my cayennes were very hot even if picked green - maybe you just got a mild one?

[momol]

Hi Jenny,

I am pretty new in growing chillies too (did grow them before when we were living in Singapore but back then was in tropic, can't take it in count ).
I grow several types of chillies this year, it is indeed a different challenge.
I think hot chillies should produce the same hotness (if the seed is not from the cross pollinated source ) but indeed the mild chillies can sometimes produce a different range of hotness ( from mild to very hot ). My Romanian hot chillies produce very variable chillies from sweet-mild to sweet-hot chillies ( apparantly, it is due to it's genetic mix, which I read it somewhere before ).
As for over wintering, I haven't tried it ( trying it this year, has brought in some 3 chillies plant from sweet to hot type ).
I read somewhere , the roccoto chillies ( C pubescens ) are the best candidat for over wintering and the seconde candidat will be C baccatum type ( those will be in my next year growing plan ).
Perhaps you could try growing them next year too, they don't need intense sun or warm but rather cool plus they will live for 3 to 5 years ( according to the roccoto chillies forum ).
Hope it help,

Momol

Hope it help,
Momol

[willowstar]

my cayennes were really quite mild this year too and I live in East Anglia...I grew them in the greenhouse and let the temperatures get really high thinking that the heat would make them hotter (Think I read that somewhere) but no luck really. If memory serves me correctly the seeds were either a freebie with GYO or KG or from B&Q. Pretty disappointed with them. Sorry, not much help but just to let you know you are not alone!

[SarzWix]

Chilli's from the same plant can be variable in temp - OH ate one straight frm the plant & was very disappointed it was really mild, he picked another t bring home & sliced a bit off b4 cooking with it & it nearly blew his head off! Don't dispair, you may have some hotter ones to come. Although the mouldy summer hasn't helped i don't think.
As for over-wintering, in our experience they do go very dead looking - when the leaves dropped off we cut ours down to a a couple of buds & they came back fine :-)

[JennieAtkinson]

Thanks for all your encouraging comments. And thanks Momol for those varieties. Will do a bit of research before next Spring.

I'm just pretty chuffed I managed to grow a few. Had loads of flowers, so perhaps if I had kept the greenhouse door shut (I left it open too long thinking I needed to!), there might have been more!

[raine]

I hadn't realised that peppers and chillies could be kept -oops!

[Cutecumber]

Do make sure that your plants are pest-free.

One of the good things about not over-wintering is that you don't help the pests survive.

[Alice]

It might be the variety Jennie, or that they weren't fully ripe. I think they get hotter if you leave them on the plant for a while after they turn red.
They do drop their leaves at this time of year. I tried overwintwring one last year with no success. It came through the winter OK but come spring it was a sorry looking thing which just didn't grow on. I'm not going to bother this year and will plant fresh in the spring. Looking forward to seeing what the chillie challenge is this year.

[momol]

Do make sure that your plants are pest-free.

One of the good things about not over-wintering is that you don't help the pests survive.

It reminds me to my rumanian hot chillies I bring in for overwintering, they turn out to be carrying aphids with them, found out some days ago...
I have sprayed all the infected plant with soap water and had repeated the spraying today. The plant seems to be doing very well, their young shoots looks very healthy and green... finger cross...
If it fail, will try fresh next spring and will also go for roccoto type...

Momol

[bramble]

Jennie the best you can do is start them off earlier next year. I bought a propogator last year and sowed my peppers on 31 of January. They had a really long growing season and it made a big difference.
You can also look up the sites that sell pepper seed and choose the ones that have a shorter growing season for where you are living. That way you can choose what suits you.