A friend gave me a pepper seedling about a month ago. He really likes those long sweet red peppers, and every year waits till they're on offer in the supermarkets, then uses the seed from them. It was a few inches shorter than the three I managed to get going early this year, so just plonked it in with them. This morning I noticed a 4" green fruit on it! All the others have flowered, but don't seem to be setting any fruit. Any ideas why this might be?
Hi Figrat, try hand pollinating them with a small soft brush, gently dabbing it into the centre of all of the open flowers. I do this every day and have an excellent fruit setting percentage. They can self-pollinate but rely on wind and/or insects both of which are a bit sparse under glass. Tapping the stems like tomatoes is also reported to work. Once a fruit gets large enough for seeds to develop, flowering will often stop so you have a choice of removing the larger fruit while it is still green and using it immediately or ripening it off the plant (which means they will continute to flower) or let the fruit ripen on the plants which gives much sweeter fruit but less of a crop.
A trowel in the hand is worth a thousand lost under a bush.
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comp, you could have had several issues. Where were the plants? Inside or outside? How often were you watering and fertilising?
A friend gave me a pepper seedling about a month ago. He really likes those long sweet red peppers, and every year waits till they're on offer in the supermarkets, then uses the seed from them. It was a few inches shorter than the three I managed to get going early this year, so just plonked it in with them. This morning I noticed a 4" green fruit on it! All the others have flowered, but don't seem to be setting any fruit. Any ideas why this might be?
Hi Figrat, try hand pollinating them with a small soft brush, gently dabbing it into the centre of all of the open flowers. I do this every day and have an excellent fruit setting percentage. They can self-pollinate but rely on wind and/or insects both of which are a bit sparse under glass. Tapping the stems like tomatoes is also reported to work. Once a fruit gets large enough for seeds to develop, flowering will often stop so you have a choice of removing the larger fruit while it is still green and using it immediately or ripening it off the plant (which means they will continute to flower) or let the fruit ripen on the plants which gives much sweeter fruit but less of a crop.
If anyone wants so pepper plants I have about 50 of them I planted for some seeds from the store. Now about 4" across and 1" high !!