Overwintering & Pruning Mystery Hot Pepper

[Dave2000]

I have a mystery hot pepper I'd overwintered in my garage, this is the one:

http://www.theeasygarden.com/forum/viewtopic.php?id=32627

Mostly I was interested in getting the remaining fruit on it ripened so I didn't trim it back at all. Usually in my growing zone plants would drop their leaves by the 1st of the year if not freeze to death in the garage but we had a very mild winter and this pepper not only survived but was bearing ripe fruit right up through January then the leaves fell off.

I just left it sitting, watered it a few times in case it survived and low and behold it has woken up and started growing new leaves. The last 4 inches or so on every branch were dead so I cut that off but otherwise it's still mostly a whole plant.

Do I need to trim it back a lot more? Pictures I've seen of others' pepper plants of various varieties were cut back most if not all the way to the bare stem at the bottom, leaving only a few inches of stem sticking out of the ground. It does have leaves growing on sites all the way to within an inch of where I've already trimmed it back. What are the pros and cons of leaving it as-is?

 

[lesa]

This is just my humble opinion... but since I am sure you plan on planting more peppers, I would let this one do its thing. It wants to live- I wouldn't have the heart to trim it all the way back. You cut off the dead- lets see what mother nature has in store. Keep us posted!!

 

[catjac1975]

I have a mystery hot pepper I'd overwintered in my garage, this is the one:

http://www.theeasygarden.com/forum/viewtopic.php?id=32627

Mostly I was interested in getting the remaining fruit on it ripened so I didn't trim it back at all. Usually in my growing zone plants would drop their leaves by the 1st of the year if not freeze to death in the garage but we had a very mild winter and this pepper not only survived but was bearing ripe fruit right up through January then the leaves fell off.

I just left it sitting, watered it a few times in case it survived and low and behold it has woken up and started growing new leaves. The last 4 inches or so on every branch were dead so I cut that off but otherwise it's still mostly a whole plant.

Do I need to trim it back a lot more? Pictures I've seen of others' pepper plants of various varieties were cut back most if not all the way to the bare stem at the bottom, leaving only a few inches of stem sticking out of the ground. It does have leaves growing on sites all the way to within an inch of where I've already trimmed it back. What are the pros and cons of leaving it as-is?



http://img811.imageshack.us/img811/6161/pepper1.jpg



http://img718.imageshack.us/img718/963/pepper2.jpg

You can see it it is staring to sprout new leaves. Cut it back stem by stem to a healthy sprout. Add new potting mix to the top. Maybe repot in a slightly larger pot. I would not plant it in the ground. You may be able to over winter this plant for many years, That is if you enjoyed the peppers.Give it a good liquid fertilizer.

 

[Dave2000]

You can see it it is staring to sprout new leaves. Cut it back stem by stem to a healthy sprout. Add new potting mix to the top. Maybe repot in a slightly larger pot. I would not plant it in the ground. You may be able to over winter this plant for many years, That is if you enjoyed the peppers.Give it a good liquid fertilizer.

Will peppers in general or particular ones, tolerate having their stem buried a bit deeper in soil or will it harm them as it does some other plants (or so I've been told for other plants)? Not so sure I have the skill level needed to transplant something this large into another pot unless I was in a zero gravity environment (or destroyed the old pot to remove it).

Adding more soil is definitely something to consider, last summer was fairly dry here and I had to water this plant twice a day even though it got a late start sprouting last year.

I have mixed feelings about the fruit, mostly about the small size so there's more labor to process them. Might make for decent hot sauce, I can sort out the seeds for that without any more trouble than with other peppers and otherwise size may not matter for sauce since they seem to be pretty mold and rot resistant.

 

[Dave2000]

It's growing buds now. I'll post another pic in a few days, kinda rainy outside at the moment.

 

[Dave2000]

The plant started producing a fair amount of leaves and blooms but apparently it was running low on nutrients as it dropped off all the pollinated blooms so there were no peppers growing larger than a 1/4 grain of rice until last week. Two weeks prior I put some 10-10-10 fertilizer, egg shells and coffee grounds in some topsoil I added to the pot and suddenly it grew twice as many leaves and those significantly deeper green in color.

I'm glad I didn't trim the plant back any more than I did, despite some cold weather we had that slowed it down, it is looking like a healthy plant with a full season of growth. I'll get a picture up sometime soon.

 

[lesa]

Success! I love a good experiment- I bet those will be the best tasting peppers ever!

 

[Dave2000]

Now a little over 2 months later the weather is finally, consistently staying warmer. There's about 100 peppers starting and a few hundred blooms. I have to feel that not trimming it back more was the right choice.

 

[RidgebackRanch]

That is stunning! I have been watching this post and was wondering how things would work out.

Looks like it's working out ver well, pleaqse keep us updated with pictures of the peppers when they are ready to eat.

Thanks for sharing