The back story: I planted pepper seeds and waited for them to germinate. I had marked each six pack with the proper name of pepper. Nothing happened, so I tried again. Still nothing - actually, some came up and were eaten by the birds. By the time I planted more seeds in the six packs, I didn't pay attention to which I planted where, and had a complete and utter mix of the two kinds. Silly me, but that's the way I roll. So I planted them. I looked at the leaf shape and growth. Nope. I looked at the leaf color. Nope. But here is the big difference, with photos even!
The difference is in the branch brackets where the bell peppers have a darker green - almost black - coloration. Padrons, no matter how big they get (a few of mine are well past 4' tall) do not develop that darkened area around stem brackets.
Since I didn't know what I had when the seeds finally sprouted, I just planted them all and hoped they'd grow. I ended up with less Padrons and more bell peppers than I hoped for but at least I knew which was which well before they fruited!
Hope this helps the next disorganized gardener!
