Teeny tiny chilli plants!

[w33blegurl]

Morning! I sowed my chillis (black hungarian, padron, apache and jalapeno) towards the end of Feb and they germinated pretty quick....but they've done very little else since! They are indoors in a bright spot in the kitchen but also under a grow light. There is underfloor heating so the room temp doesn't drop too much at night and it's lovely and warm during the day. Why are they not doing anything? The exception is a single padron chilli which is growing great and about 4 inches high! I've potted them on today as a couple were starting to look a wee bit yellow but they were not exactly root bound (although had a reasonable root system on them). I know chillis are sometimes a bit slow to get going, but some of them have not got past the two leaf stage! Any suggestions??
Thanks!

[ameno]

Chilli plants in the species Capsicum chinense can often be very slow to grow in their early stages. But all of those are Capsicum annuum, which ought to be fairly fast growing. To give you an idea, I sowed mine on the 20th February, kept them in a heated propagator until they germinated then transferred to a sunny windowsill, and they are now 6 inches tall.

I strongly suspect the compost might be to blame. It's probably lacking in nutrients, or else has too much of a certain mineral salt which is retarding growth. What brand compost are you using?

[Jungle Jane]

Do you have a photo of them so we can see what you mean? It’s strange if one plants growing well & the others aren’t? Were some slower than others to germinate because they should all have the same number of leaves I think?

[fishpond]

How long is the growlight on for-------meaning- how much sleep time do they get?

[w33blegurl]

Chilli plants in the species Capsicum chinense can often be very slow to grow in their early stages. But all of those are Capsicum annuum, which ought to be fairly fast growing. To give you an idea, I sowed mine on the 20th February, kept them in a heated propagator until they germinated then transferred to a sunny windowsill, and they are now 6 inches tall.

I strongly suspect the compost might be to blame. It's probably lacking in nutrients, or else has too much of a certain mineral salt which is retarding growth. What brand compost are you using?

Its the Sylvagrow peat free compost which is the only thing I've used this year and other plants have been growing OK< that being said I'm not averse to giving them a weak feed to see if that helps!

Fishpond - The growlight is on from 6am until around 10pm, do you think it's too long? It's on a timer so very easily adjusted to knock off (or add) a bit.

Jungle Jane - I'll try to get a pic of the and upload tomorrow! They actually look otherwise healthy, its just the very slow speed of growth that's odd!

It has struck me - they are beside bifold doors so might they be getting a bit cold at night?
Thanks!

[ameno]

Sylvagrow peat free is what I use, and it always gets a Which best buy, too, so there should be no problem with the compost.
Although how old is it? If it's more than about 6 months old then the nutrient content may have degraded by now. Giving them a weak feed may well be best.

As for getting cold at night, as long as they stay about 10c at night then it shouldn't make much difference to their growth rate.