P is for Bell Pepper

Although peppers and tomatoes are relatives in the same botanical family, there are both differences as well similarities in their culturing. Like for tomatoes, I also plant bell peppers in compost amended holes but not so large or deep. I throw a few matchsticks into the compost amended with organic fertilizer because peppers like the sulfur in matches. For both tomatoes and bell peppers, I buy an organic fertilizer composed of dried poultry manure and feathers, bone meal, and potash rock. For the price and convenience, I do not feel it is worth the effort of finding and mixing these individual ingredients. My major contribution is the home-made compost that this bought “tomato fertilizer” with a NPK of 3-3-3 is mixed into.

Like the tomatoes, I plant the peppers as deep as I can, all the way up their stems to their leaves. The deeper planting will protect the roots from summer drought. Peppers like warm soil so I wait until mid May to plant them versus mid April for the tomatoes. Unlike tomatoes, peppers like to be a little crowded so that their foliage shades their stems and roots; for that reason I plant them one foot apart so that the foliage of the mature plants will just touch to shade the ground. Peppers may stop producing in the hottest days of summer, but do not pull the plants because they will produce in abundance again when the weather cools a bit until frost. Green bell peppers will eventually color to red, yellow, orange or whatever if left on the bush long enough. Like tomatoes, we pick ours at the first blush of color and take them into the kitchen to finish ripening. Sliced peppers freeze well and we have them year round to sauté with onions for omelets, pizzas etc. We especially like them in a pepper, rice, tomato and hamburger dish called Texas Hash.

Bell peppers have little insect problems but they are subject to lose from rots. Other mild peppers you might try are banana peppers.