anaheim chili peppers leaves turning yellow

[N Arnold]

Hello everyone,
I am new to this forum and I have a million questions. I have had planted gardens for years with little success.
I have given my garden daily attention this year and things are starting to go down hill.
A little background on my garden. All of my vegetables are in pots. I live in Nebraska and the soil in this area is all clay.This is the first year I have used pots and everything looked good until about 2 weeks ago. I have 3 earth boxes and a bunch of clay pots. They are all filled with a container mix that the local earl may recommended for the earth box. I used a granulated fertilizer that was 10-10-10.

My tomatoes have almost completely died out in the last 2 weeks. Until recently I did not realize that there was 2 types of tomato vines, determinate and indeterminate. The 2 tomatoes that have died completely where bush type tomatoes. I think those are determinate. 2 more of my tomatoes are roma tomatoes and they are still alive but dying back, they have hundreds of tomatoes though. I think roma tomatoes are determinate also, so that probably explains their health. The romas are about 5 feet tall so I think they are going through their natural cyle. My final tomato plant is a big boy, which I believe is a indeterminate vine. I think the problem with this plant is the pot, it is only in a 1 gallon pot.

Anyways, onto my Anaheim chili pepper plant problem. The pepper plant looked fine unitll about a week or two ago. The top leaves are starting to turn yellow. The first problem is the size of the pot, it is maybe a 1 gallon pot. I think the yellow is because the plant is running out of nutrients but I am not sure. The plant has produce 15 nine inch peppers so far.

So my questions are.
1) Do you think the yellowing of the top pepper leaves is a nutrient deficiency?
2) Can I add a water soluble fertilizer to the plant? I have lots of miracle gro all purpose plant food 20-20-20.
3) Is water soluble fertilizer ok to use? I have read that water soluble fertilizers are not good to use because they are high in salt which messy with the p.h. of the soil.

Thanks
Nick

 

[Chuck]

Hello everyone,
I am new to this forum and I have a million questions. I have had planted gardens for years with little success.
I have given my garden daily attention this year and things are starting to go down hill.
A little background on my garden. All of my vegetables are in pots. I live in Nebraska and the soil in this area is all clay.This is the first year I have used pots and everything looked good until about 2 weeks ago. I have 3 earth boxes and a bunch of clay pots. They are all filled with a container mix that the local earl may recommended for the earth box. I used a granulated fertilizer that was 10-10-10.

My tomatoes have almost completely died out in the last 2 weeks. Until recently I did not realize that there was 2 types of tomato vines, determinate and indeterminate. The 2 tomatoes that have died completely where bush type tomatoes. I think those are determinate. 2 more of my tomatoes are roma tomatoes and they are still alive but dying back, they have hundreds of tomatoes though. I think roma tomatoes are determinate also, so that probably explains their health. The romas are about 5 feet tall so I think they are going through their natural cyle. My final tomato plant is a big boy, which I believe is a indeterminate vine. I think the problem with this plant is the pot, it is only in a 1 gallon pot.

Anyways, onto my Anaheim chili pepper plant problem. The pepper plant looked fine unitll about a week or two ago. The top leaves are starting to turn yellow. The first problem is the size of the pot, it is maybe a 1 gallon pot. I think the yellow is because the plant is running out of nutrients but I am not sure. The plant has produce 15 nine inch peppers so far.

So my questions are.
1) Do you think the yellowing of the top pepper leaves is a nutrient deficiency?
2) Can I add a water soluble fertilizer to the plant? I have lots of miracle gro all purpose plant food 20-20-20.
3) Is water soluble fertilizer ok to use? I have read that water soluble fertilizers are not good to use because they are high in salt which messy with the p.h. of the soil.

Thanks
Nick

Pics would be a definite help here. Healthy tomatos have a rather extensive root system and a 1 gallon pot is way way too small. Using chemical fertliizers on vegetables in pots will lead to heavy salt build up and burning of the root system whether granulated or liquid, which can lead to yellowing leaves and premature demise. Using chemical fertilizers in a restricted volume of soil will rapidly eliminate the micro-organisms in the soil that plants need to thrive. In other words start going Organic and use 5 gallon buckets

 

[N Arnold]

Ok, here are some pics. The first 3 pics are of the Anaheim Chili Pepper plant in question.

The next 2 pics are of my banana pepper plant that is still green.

And the last 2 pics are of a chili pepper I started on June 22 from a seed indoors, it was planted outside last week. Hopefully there is enough growing season left for this guy to produce some peppers. There should be about 60 days left.

Thanks
Nick

 

[N Arnold]

Ok, back to my 1 million questions. Lets forget about the tomatoes for now since the thread title says peppers, although I think I have read that peppers and tomatoes are related.

So going organic, the chili pepper plant from my last post that I planted on June 22, I used a 50/50 mix of container mix for a earth box, and cow manure compost. I added 3 tsp of a gradulated fertilizer in the top 3 inches of soil. I believe the plant is in a 3 gallon pot.

1) Is this considered organic minus the gradulated fertilizer?
2) Should I add salt and calcium to pepper plants?

So many questions, its kind of frustrating, I only get one shot a year for this, and then I have to wait all winter to try again. I hate the winter. I want to be ready for next year.
Thanks
Nick

 

[Chuck]

Ok, back to my 1 million questions. Lets forget about the tomatoes for now since the thread title says peppers, although I think I have read that peppers and tomatoes are related.

So going organic, the chili pepper plant from my last post that I planted on June 22, I used a 50/50 mix of container mix for a earth box, and cow manure compost. I added 3 tsp of a gradulated fertilizer in the top 3 inches of soil. I believe the plant is in a 3 gallon pot.

1) Is this considered organic minus the gradulated fertilizer?
2) Should I add salt and calcium to pepper plants?

So many questions, its kind of frustrating, I only get one shot a year for this, and then I have to wait all winter to try again. I hate the winter. I want to be ready for next year.
Thanks
Nick

All of your peppers look fine. That slight yellowing at the top is normal and show rapid new growth. I don't know what cantainer mix is but I would guess it would be potting soil and potting soil mixed with a manure compost 50/50 is excellent. Your anaheims do need a bigger container though. As for Organics you are half way there. There are many excellent granulated organic fertilizers and a few good liquid organic fertlizers as well. By using organic fertilizers you are feeding the soil, not the plant, and by doing so your soil becomes richer and richer instead of poorer and poorer as happens with chemical fertilizers. Epsom Salt is used on just about everything in the garden and calcium is also a must have for healthy plants, so by all means add both to everything you plant, especially in container gardening

 

[N Arnold]

Well that makes me feel a little better, thanks for the assessment Chuck. Should I transplant the first Chili Pepper in the green pot to a bigger pot, or should I let it go for the year? Its getting kind of late in the growing year, and I'm not sure how long it would take the plant to bounce back from a transplant. The average first frost here is Oct 12, however it has been so cool here this summer I would not be surprised if it happens sooner. I suppose with it being in a pot I could bring it inside if its supposed to frost.

Thanks
Nick

 

[Chuck]

Well that makes me feel a little better, thanks for the assessment Chuck. Should I transplant the first Chili Pepper in the green pot to a bigger pot, or should I let it go for the year? Its getting kind of late in the growing year, and I'm not sure how long it would take the plant to bounce back from a transplant. The average first frost here is Oct 12, however it has been so cool here this summer I would not be surprised if it happens sooner. I suppose with it being in a pot I could bring it inside if its supposed to frost.

Thanks
Nick

I would. Fresh peppers in the winter are really nice when it's cold outside

 

[N Arnold]

Here is what I used for the original mix. All container mix and a little of this fertilizer. The container mix has a lot of peatmoss in it, I don't know if that is normal potting soil or not.

This is what I used for the second chili pepper I planted last week.

So I am going to transplant the chili pepper in the green container. This is what I have at home, I thought I had calcium, but I do not, I can buy some.

What of this would you guys use, I assume this is all organic except the garden and plant food.
I want to get a system down now, so I am good to go next year.
Have you guys heard of butterflying the root ball? This sounds important, but I heard pepper plants don't like there roots messed with.

Thanks
Nick

 

[Chuck]

Here is what I used for the original mix. All container mix and a little of this fertilizer. The container mix has a lot of peatmoss in it, I don't know if that is normal potting soil or not.
View attachment 3341 View attachment 3343
This is what I used for the second chili pepper I planted last week.
View attachment 3341 View attachment 3342 View attachment 3343
So I am going to transplant the chili pepper in the green container. This is what I have at home, I thought I had calcium, but I do not, I can buy some.
View attachment 3341 View attachment 3342 View attachment 3343 View attachment 3344 View attachment 3345
What of this would you guys use, I assume this is all organic except the garden and plant food.
I want to get a system down now, so I am good to go next year.
Have you guys heard of butterflying the root ball? This sounds important, but I heard pepper plants don't like there roots messed with.

Thanks
Nick

Everything is good except the plant food which are chemicals. I take the butterflying the root ball as meaning to use a knife to cut down one side of the root ball and opening it up. I have never heard of this in reguards to vegetables. It is done to trees so as to elimate girdling roots which will eventually kill a tree.
Vegetables are annuals so this isn't needed. However, when you transplant your peppers into a larger pot and if they are root bound it is best if you loosen up the roots gently by hand to ensure proper watering of the entire root system and also to make it easier for the roots to reestablish in the new growing mediun in the larger pot.

If you would like to learn more about basic organics go to the forum Organic Gardening on this site. There is a lot of info that you need to know about Organics and being an organic gardener

 

[N Arnold]

I will check out the organic forum. Can a person put to much of any of the organic compounds in the pot? There will probably be guides in the other forum. Are you a container gardener Chuck?

Thanks
Nick

 

[Chuck]

I will check out the organic forum. Can a person put to much of any of the organic compounds in the pot? There will probably be guides in the other forum. Are you a container gardener Chuck?

Thanks
Nick

Using organic materials is not nearly as unforgiving as chemicals. Make a mistake by doubling or tripling the amounts specified with chemicals you can severely damage you grass, trees, vegetables or anything else you are growing. Not so with organics. Sure you can burn or kill plants with organic materials like applying too much chicken manure or too much green cow manure but most if not all of manufactured organic fertilizers are basically idiot proof. Organic fertilizers are slow release so using too much doesn't matter all that much. I guess you could hurt you plants by using way too much bloodmeal but it would have to be really an excess amount.

I am mainly an in the ground gardener but I do plant all of my herbs in buckets plus I have a couple of old bathtubs that I use for lettuce. Many years ago back when I was chasing jobs all over I always had a container garden of some type. I was never without tomatos during season and I have grown just about every vegetable there is in a container. In organic gardening it isn't about whether you plant in a pot or a pasture it is all about what you feed your soil because in organic gardening you don't actually feed your plants, your soil feeds the plants.