On Fri, 30 Jan 2004 09:20:07 -0000, "David W.E. Roberts"
wrote:

The pepper plant produced about a dozen edible peppers through the whole
season.
Given that we eat on average at least one pepper per day this didn't make a
massive dent in our purchasing of peppers.
The fruits were also slow to ripen and quite thin walled compared to
commercial stuff.

I have read that the relative fruitfulness(?) of sweet/bell peppers
can be affected for a whole season if they're set out early and
experience temperatures lower than 55F (13C). They *really* like warm
conditions. I never counted the number I got from a single plant in
hot, steamy Tidewater, but am pretty sure even here one plant wouldn't
have supplied 1 fruit per day. I've grown a number of varieties (I
like trying the different colored ones that are so expensive in shops)
and had quite different results. 'Golden Summer,' a yellow bell, was
prolific, thick-walled, and one of my favorites. 'Purple Beauty' was
most disappointing -- thin-walled and not at all vigorous.

Even in this climate, the plants are of modest size and much less
productive in terms of number and time than, say, tomatoes. If I had a
half-dozen fruit on one 'bush' at one time, I'd count myself lucky.
With a long growing season and several plants, I had as many as I
could use.