Biquinho chilli (beak chilli) dropping flowers

[Danibdo]

Hi!
I've searched the group for other posts regarding the Red Beak Chilli (Biquinho Chilli) but can't find results. I hope you can help.

I have these Biquinho Chilli that I sowed in May. One of the plants are heavy with flower buds, but despite my hand pollination, they are all dropping.

It's been a month or so and I've tried watering frequently, but also only watering when dry. I'm giving tomato feed every week and I recently bough a biostimuland with calcium and other minerals.

I reduced the light to 10h a day and moved the light higher. I've applied cooper solution (that's the white stains you might see) cause I was considering a fungal disease.

But still, flowers dropping and the leaves are hooked (clawed) and bumped. New growth is pale green and the leaves are curling.

I've inspected the plants with a 10x hand lens and I can't see mites. Could this be an infestation of microscopic mite and not an environmental / nutritional thing?

I live in Ireland, County Mayo, and my attic garden's temperate ranges from 15 to 19°C. Humidity of 60 ~ 80, up to 90 and above (its Ireland, after all). I'm using a Sonoff meter to measure temp and humidity.

Flow ring plants are under a 30W blue/red grow light. Others on vegetative state are under a 30W, 6500k, grow light.

Help?

Thanks in advance folks.

[Danibdo]

Some additional pics

[TomatoNut95]

Peppers are self pollinating and don't require assistance. The main problems with blossom drop is temperature and humidity. If it's not hot enough, or too hot, or too humid, blossoms will drop. Sadly, peppers and tomatoes are very picky about weather.

[Danibdo]

TomatoNut95, thanks for your comment.
So even indoors, I don't need to hand pollinate them Att all? Now I feel silly and sad about all the distress I've put those flowers to

[Vanisle_BC]

Danibdo, just thought I'd say that hand pollinating though unnecessary may still be not a bad idea; or at least giving the flowering plant some shaking/vibration, since there's likely little breeze or insect activity indoors to loosen the pollen.

I suppose this time around your flower drop happened before pollination could occur? Too bad. If you get the plants back to healthy condition, maybe you can keep them going and get peppers in due course. I've got a couple of peppers & tomatoes in what I hope is living dormancy, at a cool window that sees no sun. With luck they'll revive in spring and I can plant them out with a good headstart over the ones I'll start from seed.

Cheers, & good luck.

[Danibdo]

Yeah Vanisle_BC, I was doing it after watching YouTube videos and reading blogs. I know they self pollinate, but was trying to help with the brush.
I am worried about the looks and texture of the leaves.
I was trying to buy a good hand lens to check for mites, cause I've read that it takes a 30x or higher magnifying power...
Do you (or anyone else) recommend any?
I don't know how to recognise the signs, I'm too newbie..

[TomatoNut95]

@Applestar is better at figuring out leaf problems than I am.
Tomatoes and peppers are self pollinating. They require no assistance from humans or insects. However, if you have a battery operated toothbrush, use it to vibrate your plants.
Try not to let the temperature of your gardening area fluctuate too much during the day and night cycle and do your best to control high humidity.

[imafan26]

It looks like mite damage. I would take a 40x lens to see them. However, mites can be controlled with sulfur or oil. Sulfur is the easiest product to get. Copper sulfate would have to be applied multiple times. I have also dipped plants. It gets better coverage than sprays. Abemectin is also listed and is available but not in small quantities.

Flowers are probably dropping because of the stress. The mites feed on the flowers.

I have only successfully treated light infestations on larger plants. Mostly by dipping and basically cutting off the top of the peppers and repotting them. The mites can be in the soil. The whole growing space should be sanitized to keep them from coming back.

Dipping in hot water 120 degrees for 10 minutes is another method to try. It does control a range of pests and if it is done right it can kill the pests in the soil as well as the ones on the plants. However, you still have to sanitize your growing area or the mites will come back.

https://ucnfanews.ucanr.edu/Articles/Regional_Report_San_Diego_and_Riverside_Counties/Spring_2013__Hot_Water_Treatments_to_Control_Pests/


https://www.pestnet.org/fact_sheets/cap ... te_049.htm

https://www.pestnet.org/fact_sheets/cap ... te_049.htm

[Danibdo]

Imafan26, do you have a 40x lens to suggest? I saw some on Amazon, like this (https://smile.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B ... HBJE&psc=1), but I'm afraid to buy something that isn't true to advertised.

Thanks for all the suggestion. I'd like to check on it first, because from what I've researched, broad mite isn't a pest in Ireland so far.
I've sprayed the plants with Neem oil and soap, anyway, while I have the chance to buy the lens.

It looks like mite damage. I would take a 40x lens to see them.

[imafan26]

I don't use soap on chili peppers, it makes the leaves curl. Been there, done that.

Most things you will be able to see with a 30x loupe. It is actually harder to use the 40x loupe because it is easy to miss things since the area you are scanning is so small, broad mites are really small. I have multiple loupes. And the MG office has a mini microscope which is really cool since it is possible to use it with the computer to display and upload pictures. I would get the the 30x loupe or the mini microscope (my friend has one of those and it works really well to look for tiny bugs.) A couple of my loupes have multiple lenses in one loupe that you can put on top of each other. I have multiple size loupes but by far the easiest and most practical one to use for insect id is the 30x loupe for the smallest insects.

https://extension.unh.edu/resources/fil ... ep4814.pdf

Gemplers has good quality loupes that will have less distortion than cheap loupes.
https://gemplers.com/search?q=loupe

Amazon has a good selection. prices and quality varies. Read reviews. One of the lenses I have has three lenses in one. The higher the magnification, the smaller the lens focus area gets, so you actually will have a harder time finding anything to see and you will have to move the lens very slowly. I usually start with the lower magnification and I only go to the higher magnification if I need to. There are many other options than these so look around. If you can find a loupe locally it would be the best to try them out first. Amazon has a great policy on returns if you are not happy with the product. But, they do pay attention if you are a serial returner. I could not find the model that I have in my search.

https://www.amazon.com/Jeweler-Jewelers ... 922&sr=8-2

https://www.amazon.com/JARLINK-Illumina ... fts&sr=1-3

https://www.amazon.com/Carson-MicroBrit ... DWQZ61SM16

https://www.amazon.com/STPCTOU-Wireless ... 29&sr=8-16

[Danibdo]

Hi imafan26.

Thank you for all the recommendations! I already have a 10x magnifying ens (https://smile.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B010VM72AM) and bought a digital microscope (https://smile.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B07DRGR6LX) that starts at 40x so it should work. I'll update here with the pics when it arrives.

Thank you for the tip regarding soap and peppers.. I use it to emulsify neem oil when I apply it, not sure how to do it without soap tho. I've only applied two or three times I think, since I have this plant.

[imafan26]

Peppers are sensitive to both heat and cold they like it between 68 and 85 degrees. Too cold and they stop producing and seeds won't germinate well. Too hot and the flowers will drop. Although it is true that peppers and tomatoes are self pollinating, they do depend in part on wind pollination. It might be worthwhile to try Applestar's electric toothbrush trick. I usually only have to tap branches now and then to promote pollination. Actually, I really don't have to do that at all. My plants are outside and they get enough wind and pollinators to pollinate very well.

The other thing is your plant is so small. I am not familiar with that type of pepper. I have other varieties of peppers and they each have their own pepper load. Habanero has a pepper load of about 20, while super chili has a pepper load of hundreds. It is not unusual for stressed peppers to drop fruit or flowers they cannot support.

Peppers require high light to bloom and they are heavy feeders. They don't grow well in the cold and they can't be fertilized, so I don't expect my peppers outdoors to bloom well in winter. Mine do hold on to peppers and they continue to ripen. Years with warm winters like this one, my peppers will actually bloom later into the year. The peppers that live longer than a year usually will not bloom very well in the coldest months and this is normal. The room looks very dark. The peppers would be happier in a room with much more light; a window would be better even with supplemental lights.

[Danibdo]

Hi Imafan26.

Oh, that looks so gorgeous!

I keep my plants in the attic, there is where my "garden" is. During this time of the year, here in Ireland, zone 9A, they wouldn't survive outside. And all my windowsills have heater under it - The plants I tried to grow there absolutely hated it.

The two ceiling windows are loaded with other plants. I keep the tomato and peppers (taller plants) on the floor, basically with grow lights. I use 6500K 30W LED COB lights and this pepper has it's own light. I use a VegTrug home device that measures the lumens and it seams alright - I actually distanced the light from the plant a bit, to see if it would help the top leaves, and the new growth seems less distorted. Can't say if it's that, or the biostimulant with Calcium I've been applying for the past three weeks.
The plants are really short, even for the variety. I can't say if it's something with the climate here... When I germinated them in April it was warm outside and I only brought them indoors after July/August, when I finally realised it was too cold outside for them... All my beak chilli are small and very bushy. See here a reference for the expected healthy growth in warmer climates: https://screenshot.click/20_-_32_-_izfa5_-_8qtjh.png. Also, this blog has a great article in English about it: https://yougrowgirl.com/food-worth-growing-little-beak-peppers/.

I have other plants from August that are already taller than this and I hope they grow more, but all are already starting to fruit.

I hope the digital microscope arriver soon, to check it and discard mites... I rather be left with my crapy gardener skills than with mite..

Oh, and temperature wise, the lowest I've recorded so far on the attic was 15ºC (60ºF). Do you think that's too low for the chilli to set fruit?

Anyway, worst case scenario, I'm glad if I manage to keep them healthy until April. If I get one crop from it, every year, I'll be as happy as cow.

Cheers.

Although I don't have an electric toothbrush, I have something that will substitute it and already used on the tomatoes. I'll try it with the peppers tomorrow morning.

[imafan26]

My chilies won't germinate or set fruit till about 68 degrees and that is pretty true of all of my pepper varieties. They will hold on to any fruit that they have they just won't flower. The chilies do slow down in growth and ripening of the fruit. I actually never pay attention to how long it takes the peppers to ripen. It will ripen more or less all at the same time. The super chili in the picture is less than two years old and it is about 4 1/2 ft tall. It escaped from its pot and is in the ground. I have another one that is over 6 ft tall that was a volunteer. It is growing under the eave so it grew much taller. It is only about 8 months old. Super chilies and Hawaiian Chili live a long time 8-10 years if they remain healthy. By contrast bell pepper only lives a few months. Jalapeno a couple of years. My other chilies varies in life expectancy. Most live a couple of years if they stay healthy. I have to rogue the ones that get bacterial spot, so those plants that are susceptible never live long. I finally got a tepin pepper to grow. It was touch and go for a while. It was hard to germinate and it grew slowly, but it looks good now. 68 F. seems to be my magic number. Our days are relatively short but the total number of hours don't vary much. it is just short of 11 hours now and our longest day is close to around 14 hours. Sun intensity does change. The sun is farther away now so it is much milder. This is the best time of year to move my plants around the yard with the least sunburn.

This has been a warm winter so while the days get down around 67 degrees the days are in the mid 70's so the peppers can still germinate although they grow very slow in the cold.

[Danibdo]

Hi folks.

The Jiusion USB Microscope arrived and I can't see a single living creature (Or more like "moving") on my plants...

I've uploaded a video that can be watched here: https://screenshot.click/M20201230_001.mp4. On this clip I was using the digital micro on max (It ranges from 40x to 1000x).

The white texture are water crystals, most of my young plants have edema and water blistering from too much water (Guilt). I stared at the screen for ages and nothing moves like the reference video I have for broad mites (here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PexkYjLQnoU). Can you see something I can't?

The only creature I found was on my tabletop, dead (See image B). And I do can see it on naked eye, a small black dot that must be around 0.01mm or 0.02mm. I deep dived on my plants again, and can't see more of this thing on it.

I've aded a image of the beautiful fungus (Image A) on soil and a still from what I believe are water crystals (image C)

[imafan26]

What are the two brown things in your picture of the water crystals. It looks like the bug on your table?

[Gary350]

If plants feel stressed for any reason they will drop blossoms, too hot, too cold, uneven soil moisture, soil too hard, pots too small, soil to dry, not enough fertilizer, not enough potassium, not enough calcium, 1 plant per pot. Buy a Childs plastic swimming pool from Walmart, put all your pots in the swimming pool. Put about 1½" to 3" of water in the pool this will keep soil moisture even so pots never dry out. Peppers are heavy feeders, best fertilizer is, 15-15-30 with calcium to prevent BER. Potassium promotes lots of blossoms and blossoms become lots of peppers. Keep your plants in a location where they get full sun all morning the coolest part of the day. After lunch the hottest part of the day plants need full shade from a large tree, bushes, house, fence, garage, carport roof, etc. I sometimes put up white color shade cloth in hot weather but this is work, it is much easier to have plants growing on the east side of a shade tree. Cross pollination is not a problem the first year but it will be next year if you save seeds to plant next year. My sweet bell peppers, jalapeno peppers, tabasco, habanero, are all larger 6 ft tall plants they don't like pots smaller than 5 gallons. I start my own seeds in 2 gallon pots then transplant them. I have not grown pepper plants to full size plants in pots for about 35 years they do much better in my garden. You might need 2 swimming pools, 1 for large pots with deeper water & 1 for small pots with less water.

[applestar]

I finally caught up to this thread. I tried to reply earlier while on my iPhone but lost the submission so I have to try to remember what I said —-

Gist —

- I agree with Imafan that the plant looks a little too small to be attempting to bloom so desperately/set fruits — this might be the plant’s response to high stress.

- my impression is the foliage looks too green — did you say you changed fertilizer? Was it high N before? Did you say you are attempting to use bloom booster?
—- I would recommend not fertilizing until this situation is resolved. Swish your breakfast tea of coffee cup with water and give it to your plant. Juice and milk containers when finished. Drop banana peels in a jug of water and use to water.... that’s what I’ve been doing and my peppers still insist on blooming and fruiting, though not abundantly. In an indoor winter condition, my aim is not to have maximum production, but occasional bonus harvest.
—- If you have access, get some bait worms and put one in each pot. Then you can scratch in used coffee grounds or tea leaves for the worm to eat and help normalize the soil health and add fertility.

- overly green appearance could also be if you just sprayed with oil....

- Have you seen my threads with photos of mites under microscope from a few years ago. I’m envious of your new one! Even with my lame set up, 100-300x was plenty, and I agree with imafan that narrower field of view from very high magnification will make it harder to spot the occasional mites in a VAST field of empty leaf scape. (I’ll see if I can find the link)

- Try examining leaf nodes — look for nodes that are not growing “normally”. Mite infested plant will have multiple possibly browned bumps instead of single healthy growth because the mites are BLASTING the new shoots and the plant is trying to grow alternate new shoot.

- I tend to agree with imafan that the curled leaf tip (as well as the sheer sucker leaves) are suspect. Especially when leaves are curled, but peppers when sprayed with anything will end up with concentrated/condensed solution pooling and droplet at the leaf tip. Worst case, you’ll end up with dried up/dead leaftips. The high humidity might be helping to stave off that situation.


...ps... I’m curious about the dead creature — what magnification was that? Are those brownish dots in the photo above it same critter?

[applestar]

Found some older links — including informative one from imafan about mites. First two are my old posts with lousy microscope pics of mites.

Subject: 2013-14 WHO'LL BE GROWING WINTER TOMATOES INSIDE THIS YEAR?

Subject: Unidentified tomato desease -- maybe russet mites?

Subject: Creature Feature

Broad mite and cyclamen mite damage looks alike, but broad mites are more common on peppers than cyclamen mites. Cyclamen mites apparently love strawberry for hosts. These mites like to infest the buds so you see a lot of bud and distorted young growth. Usually you need a higher magnification or microscope to see these tiny guys.

Usually the spider mites and russet mites can be seen with loupes and have identifiable shapes.

Broad mites and cyclamen mites need a microscope to spot them. Even then the transluscent body of the broad mite won't be so easy to spot. Measuring 0.01-0.08 mm their damage is sometimes hard to tell apart. It could be either but the broad mites are more common on peppers than cyclamen mites so I would guess broad mites are more likely to be the culprits on peppers..

Russet mites are bigger than broad mites and cyclamen mites which need high magnification

Russet mites can be visible with magnifyers higer than 10x. They leave a greasy appearance on the leaves then they turn brown and dessicated.
https://www.everwoodfarm.com/Pest_Insec ... road_Mites

The master gardener office recently purchased a digital microscope and camera similar to this one. It is really nice since we can scan the specimen and view it on the computer screen so multiple people can see it at the same time and take a picture of it and send it back to the homeowner if we have their email. We have a microscope too. Isn't this cool!?
https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product. ... -_-Product

[applestar]

One other thing I thought of —

Temperature-wise — I have NOT grown this Biquinho (heard of it - cute fruit shape!) but my other chilli-type peppers — especially small-fruited ones, have performed perfectly fine in mid-50’s to mid-60’s winter tempersture, and even have bloomed and fruited under those conditions.

— I was also recalling Peruvian White Hab that I grew a while ago — this was a TINY plant that went crazy fruiting despite its size. Is Biquinho supposed to be a mini type? ... OK I’m seeing 30-60cm, 20-24in, then 3-4 feet for the Yellow version.....

BUT!!! During the Persephone days before and after Winter Solstice, they do not tend to grow well — they might RIPEN already set fruit. So part of the blossom-dropping might be related to that.

Every year I have over-wintered peppers in growth mode indoors, they will “pause” until about mid-month to 3rd week of January, then resume growth and start growing multiple new shoots — turning into impossible jumbled mess that need careful pruning for good scaffolds, growth directions, and shape by Spring Equinox.

[imafan26]

Peppers do "pause" in winter. I don't know if it is totally a temperature or a temperature and light thing. This winter has been warmer. Some of my peppers are actually starting to produce flowers and make fruit. Usually, in winter they will ripen the fruit they have, but flowering and growth with be checked. The peppers are indeed growing much slower than normal. The right stuff bell pepper has two tiny bell peppers that seem to be frozen in size. On the other hand the chiltepin which was the same size forever, has finally grown up. The Thai pepper seeds I planted are are also up and the seedlings need to be potted up last week already. It is unusual for me to get peppers to germinate at this time of the year. My lowest night temps are about 66, the average hi-low temps are 71-80 now. . Much warmer than usual. 68 degrees is about the minimum temperature for me to germinate pepper seeds outdoors. It is so warm that I am seeing white flies earlier than normal. Usually they aren't as active in colder temperatures. The bees are less active because they don't like the wind or the rain, but they still do forage when the weather is nice. The butterflies have been out almost every day.

[Danibdo]

This was the max magnification (1000x), so I don't think it was bugs.

What are the two brown things in your picture of the water crystals. It looks like the bug on your table?

[Danibdo]

Gary350 I have one of those big trays and I started watering them as you described a while ago. I still have the edema, despite that
I started with a bio stimulant with added calcium about a month ago, I don't think it was enough to prevent the buds from dropping, let's see how it will affect the ones growing now. The liquid feed I use every week or so is Naturesafe Plant Food With Seaweed 1L 3.5-0.23-5:

Nitrogen 3.5% w/v
Phosphorus: 0.23% w/v P2O5 (0.1% w/v P)
Potassium 5% w/v K2O (4.2% w/v K)
Sulphur: 0.2% w/v
Magnesium 0.02% w/v

You suggested 15-15-30, could it be I'm using a very week feed then?

Full sun is impossible at the moment. They are receiving 12h direct light daily, tho, from a 6500k LED COB light.

[Danibdo]

Hi applestar!

They do are very small and bushy compared to "regular" plants from the tropics, but they do are old enough, I believe, they were sown April/2020 and started to bud around October/November/2020.

Someone told me the same about the green, that it looks too dark. It has always been like that, even before I changed the feed. I was using an organic feed with added seaweed and changed to organic tomato feed after I noticed the buds.

That's a cool suggestion, about the tea, coffee and bananas. Any recommendation about how long to leave the banana peels soaking in water before giving it to the plants?

I don't have access to bait worms atm, but will look online where to get it. Would they be ok in a soil like mine, indoors and so?

I did used neem oil, when I had an issue with fungus gnats, but it was around three months ago.

The digital micro is fun indeed! It sucks that I can't be sure about using the thing correctly or not. Logically, I think that if mites were the cause of all this drama, I would see them all around, specially on the top leaves, as it seems to like tender new tissue, right? But nope: Using my 10x hand lens or using the micro on 40x or 1000x, I can't see a thing!

Nodes seem alright , the only thing that I notice is that the new leaves are almost closed, looking like they are cold LOL

I do have loads of dried up/dead leaftips.

About the dead creature — I have no idea! It was max mag magnification, that's 1000x for the digital micro. It isn't the same as the brownish dots in the photo above, cause it was same magnification.

I finally caught up to this thread. I tried to reply earlier while on my iPhone but lost the submission so I have to try to remember what I said —-

Gist —

- I agree with Imafan that the plant looks a little too small to be attempting to bloom so desperately/set fruits — this might be the plant’s response to high stress.

- my impression is the foliage looks too green — did you say you changed fertilizer? Was it high N before? Did you say you are attempting to use bloom booster?
—- I would recommend not fertilizing until this situation is resolved. Swish your breakfast tea of coffee cup with water and give it to your plant. Juice and milk containers when finished. Drop banana peels in a jug of water and use to water.... that’s what I’ve been doing and my peppers still insist on blooming and fruiting, though not abundantly. In an indoor winter condition, my aim is not to have maximum production, but occasional bonus harvest.
—- If you have access, get some bait worms and put one in each pot. Then you can scratch in used coffee grounds or tea leaves for the worm to eat and help normalize the soil health and add fertility.

- overly green appearance could also be if you just sprayed with oil....

- Have you seen my threads with photos of mites under microscope from a few years ago. I’m envious of your new one! Even with my lame set up, 100-300x was plenty, and I agree with imafan that narrower field of view from very high magnification will make it harder to spot the occasional mites in a VAST field of empty leaf scape. (I’ll see if I can find the link)

- Try examining leaf nodes — look for nodes that are not growing “normally”. Mite infested plant will have multiple possibly browned bumps instead of single healthy growth because the mites are BLASTING the new shoots and the plant is trying to grow alternate new shoot.

- I tend to agree with imafan that the curled leaf tip (as well as the sheer sucker leaves) are suspect. Especially when leaves are curled, but peppers when sprayed with anything will end up with concentrated/condensed solution pooling and droplet at the leaf tip. Worst case, you’ll end up with dried up/dead leaftips. The high humidity might be helping to stave off that situation.


...ps... I’m curious about the dead creature — what magnification was that? Are those brownish dots in the photo above it same critter?

[Danibdo]

imafan26, can you share images of the seedlings you transplanted? I'm curious about it's size and all!

Peppers do "pause" in winter. I don't know if it is totally a temperature or a temperature and light thing. This winter has been warmer. Some of my peppers are actually starting to produce flowers and make fruit. Usually, in winter they will ripen the fruit they have, but flowering and growth with be checked. The peppers are indeed growing much slower than normal. The right stuff bell pepper has two tiny bell peppers that seem to be frozen in size. On the other hand the chiltepin which was the same size forever, has finally grown up. The Thai pepper seeds I planted are are also up and the seedlings need to be potted up last week already. It is unusual for me to get peppers to germinate at this time of the year. My lowest night temps are about 66, the average hi-low temps are 71-80 now. . Much warmer than usual. 68 degrees is about the minimum temperature for me to germinate pepper seeds outdoors. It is so warm that I am seeing white flies earlier than normal. Usually they aren't as active in colder temperatures. The bees are less active because they don't like the wind or the rain, but they still do forage when the weather is nice. The butterflies have been out almost every day.

[Danibdo]

It seems the video link isn't working... Here is a new one: https://screenshot.click/M20201230_001.mp4

[Gary350]

Gary350 I have one of those big trays and I started watering them as you described a while ago. I still have the edema, despite that
I started with a bio stimulant with added calcium about a month ago, I don't think it was enough to prevent the buds from dropping, let's see how it will affect the ones growing now. The liquid feed I use every week or so is Naturesafe Plant Food With Seaweed 1L 3.5-0.23-5:

Nitrogen 3.5% w/v
Phosphorus: 0.23% w/v P2O5 (0.1% w/v P)
Potassium 5% w/v K2O (4.2% w/v K)
Sulphur: 0.2% w/v
Magnesium 0.02% w/v

You suggested 15-15-30, could it be I'm using a very week feed then?

Full sun is impossible at the moment. They are receiving 12h direct light daily, tho, from a 6500k LED COB light.

OH....12 hrs of LED light? Does your light have a light spectrum chart to show how it compared to sunlight? 6500K what? How many lumins are your lights? My work shop lights say 5700K but I don't know what that means. My lights are 21750 Lumins they are advertised at commercial green house lights $65 each free postage if you buy 2 lights. I don't remember if these lights were ordered online from Walmart or Amazon or someplace else.? These 150w lights. It will help to have plants in a small square room with walls covered with aluminum foil so light is not lost.

I buy fertilizer from farm supply because it costs less about $14 for 50 lbs. This little 5 lb bags or low grade fertilizer are $20.

I only want my peppers to have full sun early morning cool part of the day then full shade from solar noon until dark. Our solar 12 noon is about 12:55 pm by the clock every day in summer. My pepper plants do best in full shade from 1pm to dark. Our sun comes up above the trees about 8 am so my peppers get 5 hrs of full sun in summer. My peppers get 7 hours of shade = indirect sunlight. Our sun is 34° angle in winter and 88° angle in summer.

I like to put 1 pint of 15-15-15 plus 1 pint of wood ash in 5 gallons of water then stir & let is set 24 hours before I use it. Wood ash adds extra potassium & also calcium. Stir well. Next day I give each plant 1 pint of fertilizer water. 5 gallons of water dilutes the fertilizer a lot so I give plants 1 pint of water every day. I usually have 16 to 20 plants 5 gallons will last me about 2 days. There are several YouTube videos where people claim peppers need drip irrigation for best results. I might need to try irrigation this year we have 3 months of very dry 98 degree weather in TN. When I lived in AZ I used 2 liter irrigation sprayers with timer set for 12 minutes that gave every plant 1 pint of water at 9 pm every night. Come to think of it my AZ garden was planted about Dec 1 and it was 65 to 70 degrees every day all winter vs 98 degree every day in TN. Maybe my TN peppers need 2 pints of fertilizer water to do better. YouTube videos shows 1 drop of water every 10 seconds 24 hours every day in summer weather. You need to experiment to see what works best for you in your soil & your weather conditions. Peppers do not like hot weather hotter than about 85. There is a Youtube video someone with a laser thermometer shows plant leaves in full sun are 30 degrees hotter than the air temperature. I have been wanting 1 of those laser thermometers I see Harbor Freight have them $20. When we have 98° heat my plant are probably 128° my peppers look wilted in full sun after lunch. When it gets dark here my peppers stay wilted for about 4 hours after dark but if I spray plants with water hose mist to cool them off wilted leaves are gone in 15 minutes. 2 summers ago I sprayed 1/2 my pepper plants with mist to cool them off they plants that got sprayed started doing better 2 weeks later with more blossoms & more peppers. Try different things on each plant to learn what plants like.

[Vanisle_BC]

5700 degrees Kelvin is close to the color temperature of the light from a sunlit sky at noon.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_T ... ron_Kelvin

21750 Lumens is 'pretty bright' and 150 Watts is quite lot, depending on your point of view.

[Gary350]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_T ... ron_Kelvin

This link is a very interesting short novel right up my alley. When I was in grade school and high school I would read the encyclopedia in search of science related information like that. My teachers use to say, why don't you read books like Tom Sawyer like normal people.

[Vanisle_BC]

It is't a novel, Gary. Novels are invented stories, fiction - Like Tom Sawyer. This is biography; and part of the real history of science.

It's OK to read ALL kinds of material.

[Gary350]

It is't a novel, Gary. Novels are invented stories, fiction - Like Tom Sawyer. This is biography; and part of the real history of science.

It's OK to read ALL kinds of material.

Novels are long. In college if next assignment is to read the next chapter and it is a very long read people joked, that chapter was a short novel. I like biographies & history of science. I have rescued a lot of 100 year old books from the trash, industrial chemistry, industrial engineering, electronics, physics, rocket engine technology, hydraulics, math, more. 100 years ago people were not afraid to tell how things were done with photos, drawings, graphs. Now days people are afraid someone will infringe on their patent or process so you never find much in books but the technical part, all written words & formulas & drawings.

[Danibdo]

For a reference, I keep 6 chillies under 3 x 10W LED COB lights. These COB lights are 6500K and gives about 110Lm/W. I use a VegTrug meter that has a luminosity sensor and although I can't say how accurate it is, the reading is of 4500Lm on the plants canopy.

I assemble it myself and source it from this store: https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1000006 ... 4c4d30haJA

I also have 20W and 30W of the same COB light. My tomatoes are under 2 x 20W and the attic garden has 2 x 30W.

About the liquid feed and ashes, that's interesting. Do you leave it overnight so the ashes can dilute in the water? Or for a different reason?

[Danibdo]

I am definitely not an experienced gardener. I am new and do it more to learn and as a hobby, hoping one day I can be self sufficient in some way. While I can't grow outside, my attic is where I keep everything at the moment. Spring comes, I plan on moving the plants outside and want to experiment how the chilli grows out there.

This is my attic garden.