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Chilli plants with shriveled top leaves?

woodhousetony5xt8gkygwoodhousetony5xt8gkyg Posts: 1
in Fruit & veg
Hi all.  I'm growing chillies in my greenhouse and have the same problem I've had for the last few years.  Every plant (about 10 plants of different varieties) all exhibit some shriveling of the top leaves.  They seem otherwise healthy and are growing and bidding well.  I can see no sign of pests, but did have aphids on some of them earlier in the season which I treated with a spray and are clear now. Tomatoes in the same green house have a little whitefly also pretty much gone now after spraying.  I think they're well watered but not soggy. They're fed once per week.  The photo is of the worst affected plant, but every plant has the same to varying degrees. Bottom leaves all seen fine, it's the newer top leaves affected. Any ideas what the problem is?

Posts

  • Pete.8Pete.8 Posts: 11,340
    I grow basil alongside my tomatoes and noticed that during the heatwave many of their leaves went just like the ones on your chilli - so a good excuse to make pesto!
    It didn't happen to my chillies, peppers or toms, just the basil that's in the soil by the tomato plants.
    New growth now looks normal
    So maybe just the heat.

    Billericay - Essex

    Knowledge is knowing that a tomato is a fruit.
    Wisdom is not putting it in a fruit salad.
  • pinutpinut Posts: 194
    I would say that the cause is most likely down to erratic temperatures and/or slug/snail damage.

    I grow chillies on the window sill and outdoors. Only the latter seem to exhibit the crinkled leaves.
  • garrinchasuperskillzgarrinchasuperskillz Posts: 69
    a few of my chilli plants have done the same thing. it's happened over the last couple of years. I think it's the unusually hot weather we've been experiencing over the last few years. it doesn't appear to affect flower production or fruiting, but I've been moving my chillis into a shaded area during the hotter parts of the day, which seems to help with the wrinkly leaves
  • tui34tui34 Posts: 3,493
    edited July 2023
    Hello @woodhousetony5xt8gkyg

    My peppers did this last year and they were much more spindly looking than yours.  I took a photo of various specimen along to the local Garden Centre who told me they were infected with whitefly or whatever.  There wasn't a sign of life on them.  I was advised to pull them up and start again.

    Being the stubborn old "patient" gardener, I hoed around them and watered and some time - quite some time later, they came to life!!

    Heat?  Probably, as we had a cool spring down here last year and it suddenly went to heatwave early June.

    So - persevere!!
    A good hoeing is worth two waterings.

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