I'm a huge fan of chillies. I love eating them, using them in cooking, chilli oil, chilli flakes - you name it, it's in my kitchen.
This year, the good lady and I decided to grow some Apache chillies as shown below:
Chilli
They turned out really well, and with 4 plants, we've harvested well over 100 chillies. We've got some in the freezer and some in the airing cupboard drying out. They weren't that hard to grow. Rather than attempt to grow from seed, we bought 4 seedlings from the garden centre, with the idea that we'd just get 2-3 strong'uns growing - much to our suprise, they all took and shot up! We've been feeding them with Tomorite, which appears to have helped.
However, this is nothing compared to the results that this bloke has got. With some of his plants nearing 7 ft tall, it's certainly something to aim for next year! Why not check out his blog and go green with envy?
Glad everything is okay though!
September 9th, 2008 at 8:33 am
Looking at his pictures the height could be due to having such large pots for germination so the roots can spread out pretty quickly, which of course is good for the plant. But at the same time I wouldn't want anything that tall out of a pot because imagine how much energy is going into keeping the plant.
As I'm sure you're aware, it's not the size of the plant that determines the size or hotness of the chilli
Our largest chillis are about 3-4 times the size of yours but are only Jalapenos so won't be amazingly hot.
September 11th, 2008 at 11:17 pm
I moved them into small pots straight away and the roots were tiny. I think you'll find a combination of the type of plant, growing time, the size of the pot etc etc determine the size of the plant not planting them in biggish pots.
I hope that helps
I'm tired from all the energy taken from keeping my plants, in hind sight I should have got a smaller watering can.
September 15th, 2008 at 9:46 am
Well considering the discussions I've had with Khalid offsite, I assumed he'd already be aware that the size of the plant depends on the type, I was just merely pointing out a large pot would help. My own chilli plants would be bigger except I don't have the space to use larger pots so they're bound by the pot they're in, but seem to be doing okay.
Oh and 'energy' means plant/ground energy, not human. A large plant is going to take up a lot more water and feed than a small plant. Too much energy going into the plant means less getting to the fruit, especially when restricted to a pot.