I have 6 pepper plants growing outside my kitchen window, on the East side
of the house where they are sheltered from the hottest afternoon sun.

While initially I was happy to see quite a few blooms on the plants, I
have since noticed that relatively very few of the more recent blooms have
set fruit.

I have 1 Pimento, 1 Big Bertha, 1 yellow banana, 1 Gypsy, and 2 fooled you
no heat jalapenos. Pimento seems to be having the most problem, but all
seem to be suffering from a lack of fruit set. Plants are quite healthy,
and have grown from about 12" tall to 2' tall over the past month. We have
all the plants well mulched with straw, and my kids water the plants about 1
quart each morning using a ceramic watering pig thing that my wife bought.
If we've missed a day, I'll go out and give each plant a half gallon,
especially on the hottest, driest times. (we haven't had appreciable
rainfall in weeks) Day temps have been in the low to mid 80's, and night
temps in upper 50's to 60's.

My Dad used to use some sort of fruit spray on tomatoes years ago to make
higher numbers of the flowers set fruit. The resulting fruits had few
seeds, but still tasted just as good. Do they have something similar I
could use on the pepper plants in the mornings when the flowers are open?

In article , "OhioGuy" wrote:

I have 6 pepper plants growing outside my kitchen window, on the East side
of the house where they are sheltered from the hottest afternoon sun.

(snip)

I have 1 Pimento, 1 Big Bertha, 1 yellow banana, 1 Gypsy, and 2 fooled you
no heat jalapenos. Pimento seems to be having the most problem, but all
seem to be suffering from a lack of fruit set. Plants are quite healthy,
and have grown from about 12" tall to 2' tall over the past month. We have
all the plants well mulched with straw, and my kids water the plants about 1
quart each morning using a ceramic watering pig thing that my wife bought.
If we've missed a day, I'll go out and give each plant a half gallon,
especially on the hottest, driest times. (we haven't had appreciable
rainfall in weeks) Day temps have been in the low to mid 80's, and night
temps in upper 50's to 60's.

My Dad used to use some sort of fruit spray on tomatoes years ago to make
higher numbers of the flowers set fruit. The resulting fruits had few
seeds, but still tasted just as good. Do they have something similar I
could use on the pepper plants in the mornings when the flowers are open?

Since the plants are growing well, I suspect that they are over
fed and over watered and simply want to vegetate. The temps look
to be on the low side for peppers. We had a very comfortable year
here for people last summer but the garden suffered.

You might want to pull the mulch back from your peppers (unless it is
plastic) and allow the ground to warm up and dry out a little. Some
stress would be an indication to the plant that it is time to
reproduce.

http://www.fiery-foods.com/dave/garden8.asp
The Pros and Cons of Fertilizing
--

Billy
Bush and Pelosi Behind Bars
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9KVTf...ef=patrick.net
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1009916.html

On Thu, 14 Aug 2008 11:47:55 -0400, "OhioGuy"
wrote:

I have 6 pepper plants growing outside my kitchen window, on the East side
of the house where they are sheltered from the hottest afternoon sun.


How many hours of sunlight are they getting? Since the house is
blocking the afternoon sun, I'm guessing that it's a heavy shade.
If that's true, they would need a bare minimum of 6 hours of
direct sun to produce worth a hoot. The fact that they're growing
tall makes me think not enough sunlight is the problem, as well.

I don't think you're over watering, unless the soil drains
poorly, but you might want to consider watering deeply once or
twice a week rather than a quart a day. I understand getting the
kids involved, though; and I'd love to see a picture of the
watering pig!

You don't mention fertilizers, and you do seem to be getting
blooms, so you might consider tapping individual flowers with
your finger in the mornings to get them to self-fertilize.

Or:

http://www.gardensalive.com/product....cd2=1218894207

http://www.gardeners.com/Vegetable%2...efault,pd.html

or even:

http://tinyurl.com/65kto2

You don't say what zone you're in or what geographic location,
but if the temperatures you're describing are typical, I don't
think afternoon sun would be too harsh for peppers. I'm zone 8,
and my plants get full afternoon sun year after year, and do
beautifully. Even last year when we had two weeks in a row of
100F heat, the plants themselves were fine. Lost a lot of
blossoms to the high nighttime temperatures, but the plants
thrived.


Penelope

--
You have proven yourself to be the most malicious,
classless person that I've encountered in years.
- "pointed"

In article ,
Penelope Periwinkle wrote:

On Thu, 14 Aug 2008 11:47:55 -0400, "OhioGuy"
wrote:

I have 6 pepper plants growing outside my kitchen window, on the East side
of the house where they are sheltered from the hottest afternoon sun.


How many hours of sunlight are they getting? Since the house is
blocking the afternoon sun, I'm guessing that it's a heavy shade.
If that's true, they would need a bare minimum of 6 hours of
direct sun to produce worth a hoot. The fact that they're growing
tall makes me think not enough sunlight is the problem, as well.

If the plants look like buggy whips, I would agree, but if they are
filled out, four feet doesn't sound unreasonable. I'm on the north side
of a hill in a forested area and my jalapenos grow to three feet
with good production.

While temps above 100 F will cause plants to expend their energy
on pumping water for evaporative cooling, low temps would mean
not enough energy to set fruit.

To sum up: If your plants are tall and skinny, you don't have enough
sun. If you plants are bushed out, I'd cut back watering until the
ground was dry in the top 1/2 inch and feed with an organic 0-10-10.


I don't think you're over watering, unless the soil drains
poorly, but you might want to consider watering deeply once or
twice a week rather than a quart a day. I understand getting the
kids involved, though; and I'd love to see a picture of the
watering pig!

You don't mention fertilizers, and you do seem to be getting
blooms, so you might consider tapping individual flowers with
your finger in the mornings to get them to self-fertilize.

Or:

http://www.gardensalive.com/product....cd2=1218894207

http://www.gardeners.com/Vegetable%2...4,default,pd.h
tml

or even:

http://tinyurl.com/65kto2

You don't say what zone you're in or what geographic location,
but if the temperatures you're describing are typical, I don't
think afternoon sun would be too harsh for peppers. I'm zone 8,
and my plants get full afternoon sun year after year, and do
beautifully. Even last year when we had two weeks in a row of
100F heat, the plants themselves were fine. Lost a lot of
blossoms to the high nighttime temperatures, but the plants
thrived.


Penelope
--

Billy
Bush and Pelosi Behind Bars
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9KVTf...ef=patrick.net
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1009916.html

"OhioGuy" wrote in message ...
I have 6 pepper plants growing outside my kitchen window, on the East
side of the house where they are sheltered from the hottest afternoon sun.


The east side of a house doesn't get enough sun for peppers. Peppers do
best in full sunlight.

On Sat, 16 Aug 2008 11:59:05 -0700, Billy
wrote:
Penelope Periwinkle wrote:
"OhioGuy" wrote:
I have 6 pepper plants growing outside my kitchen window, on the East side
of the house where they are sheltered from the hottest afternoon sun.

How many hours of sunlight are they getting? Since the house is
blocking the afternoon sun, I'm guessing that it's a heavy shade.
If that's true, they would need a bare minimum of 6 hours of
direct sun to produce worth a hoot. The fact that they're growing
tall makes me think not enough sunlight is the problem, as well.

If the plants look like buggy whips, I would agree, but if they are
filled out, four feet doesn't sound unreasonable. I'm on the north side
of a hill in a forested area and my jalapenos grow to three feet
with good production.

Different pepper varieties grow normally to different heights.
Length of season, available nutrients, etc can effect the height
of individual plants. Corno Di Toro plants easily hit 5 and 6
feet around here, and several of the C chinense varieties get to
5 feet if we have a warm fall.

Two feet is about normal for several of the varieties OhioGuy
mentioned, but he doesn't mention how bushy they are, or the size
of the stems. He also says that they are protected from the
afternoon sun. So, how much sunlight they're getting is the first
thing I want to know.

I've grown peppers in limited light situations, the house I used
to live in had an enormous pecan tree smack dab in the middle of
the yard, and the yards on either side had large trees, too. It's
doable, but they did take more tending and fussing to get good
production. If OhioGuy has a full sun location he can put the
plants in, I would heartily recommend he do so.


While temps above 100 F will cause plants to expend their energy
on pumping water for evaporative cooling, low temps would mean
not enough energy to set fruit.

Only, they're not really expending energy to transpire. The
evaporative process itself is what draws most of the water up. As
I understand it, and it has been more years than I care to admit
to since I took any ag courses, the transpiration and heat drives
other metabolic processes that normally shut down at night. I
want to say it has something to do with using sugars for growth
as fast as it's produced instead of storing it; but I could be
conflating peppers with potatoes.


Penelope

--
You have proven yourself to be the most malicious,
classless person that I've encountered in years.
- "pointed"

In article ,
Penelope Periwinkle wrote:

While temps above 100 F will cause plants to expend their energy
on pumping water for evaporative cooling, low temps would mean
not enough energy to set fruit.

Only, they're not really expending energy to transpire. The
evaporative process itself is what draws most of the water up.

Agreed, poor choice of words on my part. The point I was trying to
make is that the evaporative cooling (water use) will take precedence
over the production of glucose and therefore vegetative growth or
fruit setting.
--

Billy
Bush and Pelosi Behind Bars
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9KVTf...ef=patrick.net
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1009916.html

There is a line of trees about 70 feet East of our house. They were
trimmed back rather heartily by the power line guys this spring. There is a
rather filtered sun from 7 to about 10:30. Then there is direct sun from
maybe 10:30 to 2:30 or so. After that, they get indirect sun for another 5
hours. The whole yard is open, so even with the indirect sun, they are
getting something.

I ended up using some of that tomato fruit set spray, and in just the last
week I now have an additional 30 peppers set on the plants.

"OhioGuy" wrote in message ...
There is a line of trees about 70 feet East of our house. They were
trimmed back rather heartily by the power line guys this spring. There is
a rather filtered sun from 7 to about 10:30. Then there is direct sun
from maybe 10:30 to 2:30 or so. After that, they get indirect sun for
another 5 hours. The whole yard is open, so even with the indirect sun,
they are getting something.

I ended up using some of that tomato fruit set spray, and in just the
last week I now have an additional 30 peppers set on the plants.

I'm glad to hear that. All our pepper plants were lost to the spider
mites and whitefly.

Out of my 6 pepper plants, 1 appears to be a bit stunted and shorter - it
is the banana pepper plant. When I look at the plant up close, I see that
the base of the plant, where the main stem meets the ground, seems to be
brown and not hard like the rest of the stem - almost as if there is some
sort of "infection". The plant has not died, but it isn't really growing
much, either. I have mounded soil up around the affected area, hoping that
it may grow additional roots through the soil. Should I apply some sort of
fungicide or other chemical? Should I tear out the plant to make sure this
doesn't spread somehow to the neighboring plants? Leaves and fruit on the
affected plant seem slightly yellower and smaller than the rest of the
plants.

Even with this shortcoming, after applying the tomato fruit set spray
roughly 10 days ago, I now have 57 peppers on my 6 plants - fully double
what I had 10 days ago, when I complained about low fruit set. One of my
jalapeno peppers has a couple of places now where there are 3 peppers
together in a "bunch"!

I would heartily recommend the tomato fruit set spray to anyone who has
healthy pepper plants that otherwise don't seem to be bearing as heavily as
they ought to be. Spraying it once and waiting less than two weeks for the
plants to respond seems to be all that is required.

"OhioGuy" wrote in message ...
Out of my 6 pepper plants, 1 appears to be a bit stunted and shorter - it
is the banana pepper plant. When I look at the plant up close, I see that
the base of the plant, where the main stem meets the ground, seems to be
brown and not hard like the rest of the stem - almost as if there is some
sort of "infection". The plant has not died, but it isn't really growing
much, either. I have mounded soil up around the affected area, hoping
that it may grow additional roots through the soil.

That most likely wont happen with a pepper plant. It will only encourage the
infection to spread by omitting air and light and dryness. I would remove
that soil and let the stem breathe.

Should I apply some sort of
fungicide or other chemical? Should I tear out the plant to make sure
this doesn't spread somehow to the neighboring plants? Leaves and fruit
on the affected plant seem slightly yellower and smaller than the rest of
the plants.

That's hard to say. It could be disease or a need for shot of fertilizer,
most likely nitrates at this time of year. Does it look diseased? Blotches
or spots on the leaves? Mottling or curled leaves? Mottled peppers?
There's an organic concentrate for disease called Serenade. It's supposed
to control molds and mildews. I just got it so don't know if it works or
not. If it looks diseased to you, you may be better off pulling it before it
spreads.


Even with this shortcoming, after applying the tomato fruit set spray
roughly 10 days ago, I now have 57 peppers on my 6 plants - fully double
what I had 10 days ago, when I complained about low fruit set. One of my
jalapeno peppers has a couple of places now where there are 3 peppers
together in a "bunch"!

What store carried the tomato fruit spray? Did you get it online? I hope
they have it at Dicken's Turff. We're going there this week, one day. My
husband thinks the Greensand will be better than the questionable Ironite.
The rest of my peppers, in very good health in the other gardens, are
setting very few peppers. Very odd. By now we're usually rolling away in
peppers. :*(


I would heartily recommend the tomato fruit set spray to anyone who has
healthy pepper plants that otherwise don't seem to be bearing as heavily
as they ought to be. Spraying it once and waiting less than two weeks for
the plants to respond seems to be all that is required.

Did you spray the open blossoms?

What store carried the tomato fruit spray?

It was our local Ace Hardware. They had an 8 ounce bottle for $6, and it
was worth every penny.