Bell Pepper Question

[Ksk]

My garden looks great including chilli pepper and all the rest.

Still bell peppers are a real challenge. I got rid of aphids early in the season and the plants look healthy again ( approx 20 - 24 inches tall).There are flowers and fruit has set nicely.

Question: The bell peppers are very small, perfectly formed but really tiny.
Am I just impatient?

My bell peppers have always been 3 on a scale of 10. In the past they had very thin walls.

I know they are heavy feeders. They are in straw bales like the other peppers that look great. Green chili’s are enourmous right next to them. I fed them with and organic fertilizer 3-4-4. I know not to give too much nitrogen and have been careful about that. Is there a way to boost them? Do they lack a trace nutrient?
Thanks in advance- All ideas welcome.

[imafan26]

Do you know what kind of bell peppers they are, some of them are mini and only 1/3 the size of a normal bell pepper.

[PaulF]

Sometimes bells are more difficult than other types, depending on your location and the variety grown. If you would share your location it would help. Where I am the only bells to ripen are the shorter season varieties. Weather has a big part to play as well. This year my peppers are very slow to grow and there is nothing I can do about hot and dry.

[Ksk]

I live in New Mexico- 6500 ft above sea level.
Planted them in May.
Zone 7a.

[PaulF]

As a flatlander, my experience would be of no assistance to high elevation gardening.

[imafan26]

Actually, bells are more difficult even in low elevations. They only grow well for me in a very narrow range of temperature between 70-85. Below that, it can be hard to get the seeds started without a heat mat and above that the peppers stop making peppers. They are less resistant to diseases too. I have much better luck with the Italian, corno d'toro, and asian sweet long peppers. They produce more abundantly and are more tolerant to heat. In a good year I will only get 5-8 bell peppers. Some places get peppers until frost. I only get peppers until they succumb to pests and disease.

[PaulF]

After years of having bells never give anything but green bells, I switched to some short and mid season bells. The difference has been nothing short of miraculous. The past three seasons there have been yellow and red bells to go along with the usual greens. However, because I went through all the peppers in Tatianna's database and found some new bells rather than those designed for long season southern growers, there were ripe bells in the garden. Now that Tania and Stan are retiring from the seed selling business, it may be a problem finding those varieties again.

I never had a production problem with long season bells, it is just that they were getting into full swing just as the frost hit.

[rainbowgardener]

Peppers are slow, but from May to almost August to be really tiny sounds like something isn't working right. Was May when you planted seeds or when you put little plants in the ground? Early, mid, late May?

This https://honestcooking.com/time-lapse-growth-bell-pepper/ has a time lapse video of bell peppers going from flowers to red, ripe peppers in six weeks. For some, it might be two months.

Unless your soil is really poor, I'm guessing the problem isn't nutrients but water. Either under or over watering could slow them down/ stunt them.