Pepper plants - should I be worried?

9 years ago

Since this is my first time planting veggies in beds, I'm not sure if I should be concerned with the things I'm noticing in these two plants. I thought you good people might be able to lend your expertise.

I live in zone 5a, which has nice black soil on top and clay about 4-5 inches below that. This is my first vegetable bed here. I dug it up in the fall, added manure and covered with straw for the winter. Then in the spring before planting, I lifted the mulch, added more manure, Espoma biotone (3-4-4) and blood meal, mixed it up again and put in my starts: a yellow bell pepper and jalapeno about 18 inches apart.

We have had a very rainy June--it's rained nearly every day. But prior to that, I made sure soil around the plants did not dry out.

Individual plant details below:

Yellow Bell - planted early May. Started three fruits pretty quickly. (You can see in the photo attached.) The plant has continued to flower, however, these flowers do not seem to be leading to fruits. Should I be concerned or is the plant conserving energy for the three fruits it's already developing? From the photo, you can see that a few of the lower leaves have yellow spots. Not sure if this is related or bad.

Jalapeno - planted late May (photo in next post). Start seemed pretty mature when planted; it was already starting to form buds. But so far, nothing has really happened. The buds never turned to fruit. The leaves here are yellowing in a way that looks like some sort of fungal problem. They were actually worse a couple of weeks ago, but have greened up for some reason. Flower production has nearly halted. It's a long story, but I have another jalapeno start (different source) that I still haven't put in the ground, and it's already fruiting. So it seems there is something wrong with this one.

Any advice? As I said, it's been very wet here for the past four weeks. My tomatoes seem to be fruiting nicely so far. But my eggplants keep dropping blossoms, so it made me wonder if the peppers could be experiencing similar stress.

Thanks!
Jenny

Comments (9)

CurlyJenny
Original Author
9 years ago
Correction: I'm in zone 6a.

And here is a photo of the jalapeno plant. (Sorry, I don't know why it's formatting them horizontally.)
Slimy_Okra
9 years ago
If it has been that wet, it's probably the mulch. It doesn't allow the soil to dry out and/or warm up. Organic mulches for warmth-loving plants should be used only when summer heat arrives.
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Ohiofem 6a/5b Southwest Ohio
9 years ago
Both photos are the same, probably the jalapeÃÂ±o since I don't see any fruits. The plant looks too young to produce fruit yet. Peppers need warm soil that dries out between waterings/rain. It's also possible that they're getting too much nitrogen from all the manure and blood meal you used. Have you fertilized with anything that provides phosphorus and potassium? They need a balance. In a first year garden, you usually need to supplement until the soil microorganisms can start doing their thing.
CurlyJenny
Original Author
9 years ago
Sorry, here's the bell pepper photo.

Thanks, Slimy. I've moved aside the mulch to let the plants dry out a bit.

As for fertilizing, I actually used a compost-manure (not straight manure) with some espoma biotone which is 3-4-4. I have not fertilized since. What would you recommend using, Ohiofem?

Thanks, all!
Ohiofem 6a/5b Southwest Ohio
9 years ago
I hesitate to offer advice since I do all my gardening in containers. I'm glad to hear your manure was mixed with compost. But I think your plants need a little more fertilizer, and the blood meal is only providing the nitrogen. The compost feeds the soil, but it can take a couple years of feeding the soil before it really benefits the plants.

An organic option that works a little faster -- which can be expensive -- would be a mixture of fish emulsion and liquid seaweed. There are also balanced organic fertilizers made by espoma that are a little more potent than Biotone, like Tomatotone or Gardentone. Other brands are also available. If you don't object to chemical fertilizer, something with a balance of all three nutrients plus calcium, magnesium and micronutrients would be good.
seysonn
9 years ago
I agree with Ohiofem. My impression from looking at your pictures has been, though they look healthy but can benefit from some extra dose. My practice is to do it lightly but more frequently until I can read my plants.
CurlyJenny
Original Author
9 years ago
Great. Thanks, Ohiofem and Seysonn.I have some fish emulsion/liquid seaweed which greened up some yellowing flower seedlings in another bed. I will try it on the peppers and see what happens. Maybe half gallon each to start? Recipe is 1/8 cup to 2 gallons. Or would you dilute it further? It seems pretty mild.
Ohiofem 6a/5b Southwest Ohio
9 years ago
My jug of Neptunes Harvest FE & Seaweed Liquid Ferilizer says:

Use 1/8 Cup (1 fl. Oz. or 2 Tablespoons) per gallon of water. Feed vegetables, flowers, trees and shrubs every 2-3 weeks. Apply until soil is saturated or as a foliar feed until leaves are wet, top & bottom. It is best to foliar feed early or late in the day.

So unless your mix is a lot stronger than Neptune's Harvest, I would double the dose. When I water with the mixture I do it until the soil is saturated around the plant. Depending on how wet the soil already is, that could mean a gallon or more per plant.
CurlyJenny
Original Author
9 years ago
Yes, my bottle is the same. I just mis-remembered. Many thanks for all your advice! Luckily we've had a few days with no rain, so they've had a chance to dry out. I fertilized this morning. I'll report back with progress!