The chilli plants have been really busy over the past month, putting on even more growth and producing lots of pods.
I even had a very productive second harvest from the plants last weekend.
It’s definitely getting over crowded in the staging house. All the plants in there have just shot up and out in all directions. It’s like they know it’s coming to the end of the growing season and need to get cracking.
September Update
Both my Basket of Fire plants and the Loco F1 plant are full of colourful pods. These two varieties, it’s fair to say, have done most well compared to my other six or so varieties. The more small and compact the plant the better they seem to fruit. I presume this is because they are quicker to fruit than their larger counter-parts like the 7-Pots and the Aji Umbas so can make the most of the summer to flower.
All the plants look good and healthy still. I cannot believe how tall a chilli plant can grow. Bigger pots indeed produce much bigger plants. I’m at the stage now where those situated on the bottom of the grow house and mini made chilli house are growing through the top shelves in any tiny space they can find through the wire shelves above them.
There are still many flowers being produced on the compact varieties but the larger plants just aren’t getting there quick enough and I fear time really is running out as we officially head in autumn this weekend. I’m not sure what I can do to help the bigger varieties along? I could of course bring them indoors but I don’t think I’d get away with this without the Boss seeing.
I’ve slowed the feeding down now because I want the plants to put all their energies into making the pods rather than any more plant growth. I think I’m doing that the right way around but we’ll see.
Pests
The caterpillars have been and gone now so the only real pests that remain appear to be the slugs and snails. To get around this problem I had to halt them by applying organic slug pellets around the plants and the rest of the time I’ve been manually collecting any molluscs I’ve seen on a daily basis. Combined this two counter approach seems to have kept the worse of the plant munching to a minimum.
