Early last summer I bought a tiny chilli plant from Homebase (it was
half-price by then), and potted it up. It soon grew and flowered and
chillied, and I started using the chillies. Every time our daughters
came to visit, I also gave them a bagful of chillies. I used it ever
since, and today I harvested what was left: 210 of useable size, not
counting the tiny ones or those that looked dodgy.

I'd never grown chillies befo are they always this prolific?

--
Klara, Gatwick basin

Klara wrote:
Early last summer I bought a tiny chilli plant from Homebase (it
was
half-price by then), and potted it up. It soon grew and flowered
and
chillied, and I started using the chillies. Every time our
daughters
came to visit, I also gave them a bagful of chillies. I used it
ever
since, and today I harvested what was left: 210 of useable size,
not
counting the tiny ones or those that looked dodgy.

I'd never grown chillies befo are they always this prolific?

No, I'm afraid not. They are prolific, but it depends on variety and
conditions. I'd save seed from that one for next year; but I can't
promise you the plants you get will be the same. If you need that
many chillies, it may be safer to have three plants.

--
Mike.

Klara wrote:
Early last summer I bought a tiny chilli plant from Homebase (it was
half-price by then), and potted it up. It soon grew and flowered and
chillied, and I started using the chillies. Every time our daughters
came to visit, I also gave them a bagful of chillies. I used it ever
since, and today I harvested what was left: 210 of useable size, not
counting the tiny ones or those that looked dodgy.

I'd never grown chillies befo are they always this prolific?

Mine were prolific although the fruits themselves left a lot to be desired,
they were huge (about 150 - 200mm long) and very wide, each plant produced
about 20 red ones and when the frost got them last week they still had about
30 green ones on them and even flowers still, the main drawback was that
they weren't chilli, they tasted like a mildly warm capsicum! - they still
got eaten though and it served me right for taking the seeds from a
supermarket chilli last Febuary, the main problem I have with growing them
is green and white fly, they absolutely love them when they're young, so
much so that I lost almost half of this years and all of last years
seedlings to them...they are fairly easy to grow though and benefit from
being treated much the same way as tomatoes, plenty of food and heat and not
being allowed to dry out, I'm purchasing some seeds of the more exotic
varieties for next year, and I might keep them in the house for a few weeks
until the G & W flies have found something else to focus their attentions
on.

In article , Phil L
writes

Mine were prolific although the fruits themselves left a lot to be desired,
they were huge (about 150 - 200mm long) and very wide, each plant produced
about 20 red ones and when the frost got them last week they still had about
30 green ones on them and even flowers still, the main drawback was that
they weren't chilli, they tasted like a mildly warm capsicum!

I've had mixed results. Hungarian Hot Wax and another hot chilli were
both prolific - but with very little heat. The odd thing is that
different chillies on the same plant seemed to vary in heat. A (very)
few were hottish; most were very mild and a few were mild when first
tasted, but after a few days in the fridge they became hot!

Same thing happened last year to them too.

However, a little chilli that looked almost like a bush - can't remember
the name - had hundreds of very small chillis - all of which went very
red and were very hot - absolutely excellent.

I agree with the greenfly statement - mine also needed a lot of hand
rearing to keep tiny little caterpillars off them. They all ended up
with a lot of leaves looking like an unpatched patchwork quilt. Didn't
seem to cause a problem.

The 4 "bell" peppers all did really well too - enormous very red peppers
that were full of juice and tasete.

--
regards andyw

I bought some rainbow chilli's off the net which are supposed to go
through many different colours while growing. I'm going to try them
next year .

I've also applied for some chilli seeds as part of the Gardener's World
Chilli trail. I don't know yet whether I've successfully received some
of the free seeds but I thought it would be fun to join in the trial (
I think details of this will still be on the Gardener's World website
http://www.bbc.co.uk/gardening/tv_an...al_index.shtml
)

Looking forward to some nice HOT meals next year