I have started seeds indoors for a few years and really only have decent success with peppers. Last year I got LED shop lights to help and boy did the seedlings take off. My problem isn’t growing the seedlings out, is why do I end up with minimal vegetables on the plants or none? Peppers don’t grow as big as they should. Located in Hudson Valley, NY. TYIA
I am not familiar with this term, can you please explain it?
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also, what kind of peppers are you growing? where did you get the seed from? When you say peppers don’t grow as big as they should do you mean the plant or the actual fruit?
Meant to be vegetable lol damn autocorrect
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I buy a bunch of different seeds through burpee and get some seeds from neighbors.
Would love to have better success with squash and pumpkins
for bell peppers, having the right nutrients is key. Variety also makes a big difference. I don’t much trust burpee anymore, i find their descriptions to be marketing for the variety, not real descriptions. I get most seed from Baker Creek now personally. Here is the bell pepper that they sell that i have had great success with:
Yellow Monster Pepper (rareseeds.com)
When it comes to bell peppers, pick the first one green, and then pick the rest when they have not 100% colored. This will increase the production per plant as the plant thinks it never got to fully develop the seeds. A regular feeing schedule favoring phosphorus and potassium will also help with more blooms and fruit. Too much nitrogen only causes the plants to leaf out. You will need to experiment to see what works best in your particular setup.
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How exactly are you starting the seeds? What are you using for fertilizer and how often are you fertilizing once you have your seedlings planted? Do you prune the pepper plants?
This is an idea of my set up. I do t mess with any fertilizer bc I don’t really know how much to apply. I’ve used chicken manure mixed into my soil. I want to start using the right fertilizers. I do not prune any peppers.
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peppers are “high feeding” plants and need fertilizer starting from their first true leaves. usually liquid fertilizer while they’re still small or you can top dress something. nurseries will commonly incorporate controlled release pellets like osmocote in any mix used as they’re potted up (none used in the seedling mix)
here’s a video from a canadian grower, he does mainly ornamentals but it’s the same idea. as far as rate, he recommends about 1/2 the listed rate on a liquid feed container
btw your light could stand to be closer unless it needs to be far because gives off a lot of heat. light intensity falls off with the square of the distance from the source
another source for the rate - this one about 1/4 to 1/2 the listed rate on a liquid feed container
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I agree with @z0r, your plants are way too far from your light, that will make them lanky. There’s a fix for it, of course and that is making sure you cover almost all of the stem (up to the leaves) when you transplant these into bigger containers. I’m assuming since you aren’t using fertilizer you are planning to transplant (even still again, I agree with z0r, I would feed every other week… I like to use Neptune’s products).
As far as the pumpkins and squash go, you can start them inside, but if you really want strong plants, I would suggest that you direct seed them where you want them to grow. The plants just tend to do better direct seeded in my opinion. If you want to start a few early outside, consider planting the seed under a cloche made out of a gallon milk jug with the bottom cut out or if you have the extra money, Wall O Water or similar season extenders, work great.
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I should have mentioned this was last planting season! So with that help I will make sure to improve that this season! I want to start using fert for my plants. Want to have good produce this season!
Any recommendations of watering seedlings? Do you guys suggest watering from
The bottom?
I water my seedlings from the bottom.
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I water from the bottom too.
How do you know when you’ve watered enough? Not to over water?
I let my soil dry out in between waterings. Not so dry that the plant leave droop though.
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Took your advice and ordered seeds through this company. Was excited to see the really hot pepper seeds they offer.