#overwintering peppers

[venvsflyytrapp]

My NuMex Orange Spice jalapeño I have inside had finally ripened for the first time.

It’s so small and cute, I can’t wait to taste it and save the seeds.

[balkanradfem]

So I had this pepper plant randomly grow on my balcony, I'm not sure if I even planted that, sometimes edible plants will grow without my intervention because seeds get lost in the soil. Anyway I didn't pay any attention to it, because it's too late to transplant it to the garden, it was growing in the middle of the summer, and I just put it next to my other plants so it would get watered.

I noticed the other day that the plant was starting to grow little fruit on it! It had tiny little peppers! They were adorable, and quite admirable because that plant had only tiny bit of soil to grow in, it was ambitious to go and try growing peppers from basically no nutrition.

Peppers can actually survive the winter if you grow them in a pot and put them inside, you can have them next spring producing peppers again! They're not gonna produce in winter when there's not enough hours of sunlight, but they can be a nice ornamental plant. So I decided, this would be the destiny of my little volounteer pepper. I moved it into a bigger pot that happened to be empty, and took off all of the tiny peppers, so the plant would focus on producing bigger roots instead. Once a plant produces seed she can call it a day and die because she fulfilled her purpose. If you take seeds/fruits away, she will re-evaluate her situation and try growing bigger. That's what I want!

See this little grey plastic pot I'm holding, that's where the plant managed to grow to this size and grow fruit. I think that shows a level of stubbornness and resilience I'm looking for in a plant. This is going to be my pet pepper growing in my kitchen during the winter and hopefully, possibly, she might give me peppers early in the spring.

[jensownzoo]

It begins.

Got the pepper and eggplant seeds in their sprouting bags (zip lock baggies with moist paper towels) and got the heading cabbages (4 varieties) and 2 lettuces planted in cells for later transplant this week.

I really like the sprouting method--it's simple, you can see which seeds are duds, and can plant one viable seed per cell without wondering if they're failing to germinate for a wide variety of reasons. I've been much more successful with certain types of seeds this way.

[lo-carb]

Goth bell peppers acquired

[queer-ecopunk]

Can we see Dave? I didn't know peppers could love that long

Peppers can live for multiple years! Here was Dave at the end of last season.

If Dave is a scotch bonnet, his life span is about 3-5 years. Currently he is overwintering in my kitchen window. I used to have a good grow light for him in the winter, but in the new apartment there isn't a great place to set it up so he is just surviving off of ambient light.

His stem has become quite thick, I will be removing the boba straw this year that I used to use for support. Soon it will be warm enough that I can move him back outside, where hopefully he will regrow his leaves and have another good harvest.

[invoke-parlay]

Promoted this overwintered pepper back to full sun ☀️

May 2, 2024

[brightgnosis]

Rested for about half an hour after we got home, then made a nice Soup for dinner based on a video I saw on TikTok earlier in the week.

3 packages frozen Butternut Squash, 1 package frozen Carrots, 1 package frozen Sweet Potato, 1 Onion, 1 container Vegetable Stock, 1/2 container Heavy Cream, 1 stick Butter, Garlic, Ginger Paste, Paprika, Cayene Pepper, Salt, Black Pepper, 2 sprigs fresh Sage; cook to mush, then blended until smooth. Add package of Cheese Tortellini and cook till done.

It was delicious- and way more filling than either of us really expected to be. Even my Husband enjoyed it, and he's not a big soup fan.

But bonus points for it being Kosher. And double bonus for it being largely low FODMAP (save the Cow Dairy, which sets off my IBS personally- which is why I switched to Goat Dairy. Still have yet to find an alternative to Half and Half or Heavy Whipping Cream though, sadly). So it was a win all around; definitely one to keep in the book.

Now, though, I've dosed myself with half a 25 mg Delta-8 gummy, a Maximum Strength Tylenol, and it's time for a soak in the tub with my Pain Soaks- then, once I'm done, I'mma smother myself head to toe with Pine Oil and then drink myself some fancy Hot Chocolate. Because both my hips and my right knee are killing me, as well is my right arm, and I will 100% feel even worse tomorrow if I don't.

I just hope my little Swallowtail buddy doesn't mind since the Rue it's hitchhiking on is overwintering in the bathroom, and I like baths the temperature of a Lobster Boil and the humidity to match 😬

[realniggatears]

These red clover seeds are too cute.

I get more sun around my home in the winter time even though I am south facing. The trees block out the sun a lot in the summer time.

Playing with Swiss chard, garlic, mustard greens and arugula.

I am also treating my home as a greenhouse. Trying to start seeds inside without a heat mat or grow lights (might buckle on the heat mat). Trying to overwinter some peppers, eggplants, a sweet potato plant and some tulsi. Most of them are perennials and with them already being mature plants could mean more yields.

[xofemeraldstars]

trying to overwinter my pepper plants 🌱🌶️🥶

[jensownzoo]

Well that's a sense of accomplishment! I got all my transplanting done today that it is possible to do without putting in whole new beds (on the agenda), minus the baby basil that's too small to do anything with yet. Hopefully the storm that's rolling in right now will gently water everything in and not pound them flat.

This is the front yard bed (and little bed of fennel, strawberries, and spearmint to the side). There's a permanent flowerbed wedged up against the porch, but then we have a row of favas and borage, a row of peppers (all small-sized fruiters since it's part shade), the stepping stone walk that has crimson clover/Kentucky colonel mint/numerous cosmos seedlings/and two passionfruit vines, then a row of tomatoes, then a row of peppers, then a row of eggplant, and then the sidewalk.

This raised bed is more or less in the middle of my paved "backyard". It's got perennial pea vine in the front, sunchokes in the rear, a line of beet seedlings in the center, six Heinz 1350VF tomatoes on the sides along with marigold seedlings, and I transplanted in the five little sweet potato vines that I overwintered from my late summer experiment growing slips. One of the vines had a tiny sweet potato growing about the size of my pinky. This bed may be a little iffy because it's still pretty mulchy. I'm going to keep an eye out for nitrogen issues and add it as necessary. You can also see the bed with my snap peas to the left with an A-frame trellis made from two woven fence panels.

This bed is along my rear privacy fence facing the alley. It gets weird sun so I planted all my Japanese black trifle tomatoes on the right side (towards us in the pic) and put some cherry and pear tomatoes in the shadier left. Also have morning glory and hyacinth bean sprouting at the back which will climb up the crib spring panels and drape over the fence.

This is the big raised bed running all along the property line on the west side and has a semi-privacy fence (it's like a picket fence but 6 feet tall) as a part of it's build. It's divided into four sections, though you can only see three here (the fourth is nearly entirely shaded and currently is full of mostly kale and covered with row cover. I just finished installing the hardware cloth on the fence and over a top frame yesterday. The front of the beds (to the left) will eventually have doors of framed hardware cloth too creating a garden cage to keep wildlife from stealing everything. In the nearest section pictures, there are two pear tomatoes and 8 tomatillos (2 varieties). The next two sections have tomatoes and basil. All three beds have nasturtium, French marigold, and zinnia seedlings growing at the front edge, but they're still very tiny. There's also a salvaged mum in the second bed that I hauled out of the green waste dumpster in the fall and stuck in the ground to see if it would survive. It did. No idea what it will look like either.

Tomorrow is for inside tasks, but I want to get some zucchini, winter squash, and the first planting of beans in the ground this weekend so they can sprout and get growing.

I'm delaying putting in cucumber this year until the peas are done in hopes the cucumber beetles will fuck off elsewhere and I won't need my insect net bags. They worked well until the plants got very leafy--they then developed fungal disease due to the reduced air circulation. I still got some cucumbers, so it was better than the year before, and I killed literally thousands of cucumber beetles with my unprotected trap plant. But going to try a bit of tweaking to the method and some patience. I would like enough this year to restock my pickles AND eat fresh.

[randomactsofpigeon]

It's not supposed to freeze tonight, but it's getting close enough to make us nervous. So we did our last harvest of tomatoes and peppers (obviously open to doing another if it doesn't freeze for another few weeks), pulled in all of the plants that need to overwinter in the house, and generally battened down the hatches. Really feels like fall now.

[garden-with-squid]

7/3/23

Found a bit of blossom end rot on this Better Bell pepper, so I used it in a lovely omelette. Idk why the BB makes weird looking leaves/fruit, I’m probably going to pull it at the end of the season and overwinter the others in bed 3.

We had enough cherry tomatoes for a delicious pasta lunch today too. So sweet, no extra sugar needed. I found a cute twin tomato.

Yesterday we blended the Armenian cucumber into an agua fresca. It smelled just like cucumber, but the texture reminded us of watermelon rind. Maybe I harvested at the wrong time? Still tasty and refreshing when blended with fresh watermelon.

Feels good to harvest and enjoy food from the garden 👍

Bonus: Molly sunbathing

[queer-ecopunk]

Container garden update!

Got a few tomatoes coming in!

The beets, potatos, and cabbage are all getting taller and leafier.

Put up the only wire thing I own for my peas to climb on, though hopefully I can get some tall dowels for when they outgrown this.

My squash are still in a terrible container, but are producing nice, healthy leaves and a few flowers.

My overwintered pepper plant is doing... questionably. Only time will tell if she produces this year.

[inthecityofgoodabode]

October 2022: Life & Light

We dug up & potted these six Candy Cane pepper plants from Plot 420. We’re going to try overwintering them in a sheltered place. We’ve seen a few Youtube gardeners who did it successfully so we’re going to give it a try: 

Today’s backyard garden harvest. The two beans on the right are either Kentucky Wonders or Blue Lakes. I’m not sure because we planted both & the ink faded away on all our plant labels. The three hairy-looking beans on the right are Black Coat runner beans that we got from Baker Creek. I’ll be honest, as late as we planted these runner beans, I didn’t expect we’d get any fruit: 

It’s been awhile since I posted a photo of the grapevine. No flowers or fruit this year but it was its first year so maybe in 2023: 

The Red Menace in his hidey hole with a Santa Claus melon. Yep, those are pantyhose supporting the melon: 

The first of our collard green patches: 

We made this collard green patch with seedlings we thinned from the first patch: 

This is just a gorgeous plant nearly all year round: 

Black soldier fly larvae. The colder temps have slowed them a bit but they are still working their magic in our compost bins: 

A trio of black vultures in flight heading south: 

[broodsys]

ive rly been struggling to get the planting beds out back to be rly functional, but im pretty optimistic about two of them. btwn the cats and the exposure, seeds dont stand a chance and a lot of transplanted plants havent done well, possibly due to a high nutrient content since a lot of the soil came from the worm bin

last year i transplanted the mature gooseberry into one of the beds (the planting beds aren’t that big, no more than 3x6ft) and for now some violas around them to help retain moisture and add some color - interestingly, those violas actually overwintered and kept blooming, versus all my others which have died back, so it’s promising re heat retention

the other promising one i filled with wood and covered that with dirt and coffee grounds and then planted my three blueberry plants alongside the wood. i think they’ll get a lot more light there and actually be able to bear, and im hoping the wood slowly breaking down will provide them with a lot of nutrients and foster mycelium growth - ill have to keep an eye out that it doesn’t start to rot the actual blueberry stems, but i think it’ll be okay

my other two beds are unplanted and unplanned, altho if any of these old pepper seeds im trying to germinate actually make it, i think transplanting them eventually into one of the beds would be good. what i rly need to look into is like... “perennial” veg, either literally or in the sense that it just spreads or self-sows or whatever and isnt smth i have to buy and/or plant every year