Category: Peppers

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2021: Plenty of Peppers

This year I grew bell and poblano peppers. The poblanos have been producing for a while now, but I just started picking the bells. I don’t pick the bell peppers when they’re green (even though it would improve my yield!). I wait till I see a little red, then pick them, and let them ripen on the counter.

They seem to have survived the early season drama of tardy transplantation and cabbage crowding. In fact, all the plants are doing very well.

The bell pepper variety is called California Wonder TMR, and the poblano variety is Baron F1, from Johnny’s Selected Seeds. I’ll update at the end of the season with yield information.

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Peppers are Perennials?

I had no idea. According to info on the internet, if I could protect my pepper plants from frigid temperatures over the winter, I could use the same plants next year and get fruit much earlier than I usually do. That’s a smashing idea! I’ve got three poblanos and three bells out there now, and I’m definitely going to try it.

I potted up two poblanos and 1 bell and they’re in the basement near the grow lights.

I can’t wait to see what happens!

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Nightshades and Brassicas Don’t Mix (but I did it anyway)

It’s only for a few weeks.

Apparently they both feed heavily on the same nutrients and would stunt each other’s growth if interplanted.

I wasn’t planning on planting them together. I was planning on planting one after the other (cabbage and kohlrabi in the spring and tomatoes, peppers and eggplant in the summer), but the first wasn’t finished when it was time to plant the second. So I researched the advisability of planting the second amongst the first. The answer was a resounding no.

But waiting would put me weeks behind schedule, so I did it anyway.

After harvesting two cabbages that were (almost!) ready, there was room on the end of the bed for two tomato plants. The eggplants went in where the kohlrabi came out. Then I just tucked the peppers in wherever there was a break in cabbage leaf-cover. That left me with 3 tomato plants and a pepper or two. The peppers I tossed (in the compost pile). The tomatoes I planted in grow bags.

I know I have to amend the soil in Bed #1 pretty heavily. If I encircle the root ball of each individual plant with compost (like a fertility forcefield) maybe all the dire predictions on the internet won’t come true.