They Sowed Sweet Peppers, But Collected Bitter Ones

2024 Author: Gavin MacAdam | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 13:38

Surely every summer resident will at first glance distinguish sweet vegetable peppers, which are stuffed, used for salads, put in borscht and soups, from bitter spicy, which serves as a spicy seasoning for various dishes. Imagine the surprise of inexperienced gardeners when, having planted seeds and harvested sweet pepper, it tastes bitter than bitter! How did such a miracle happen?

Magic pollen

To understand this phenomenon, you will have to remember the lessons of botany. Pepper belongs to facultative self-pollinators, and its flowers are able to pollinate not only with their own, but also with extraneous pollen. In large-fruited - sweet - peppers, the pistil is located at the level of the anthers. This structure of the flower leads to self-pollination. And in sharp ones, the pistil rises above the anthers. This is more conducive to cross-pollination. If these two species are planted on a plot close to each other, the plants are highly likely to be pollinated, and the bitterness of a small-fruited relative will appear in the fruits of the sweet variety.

Other important conditions for growing pepper

What else do you need to know to grow an enviable pepper crop? First of all, it is important not to forget that they are extremely demanding on heat, because it migrated to our gardens from tropical latitudes. Optimal conditions for plant development are daytime temperatures of + 21 … + 27 ° С, night temperatures - + 16 … + 17 ° С. Temperature fluctuations both in the direction of decreasing and increasing the level of the thermometer have a detrimental effect. So, at + 13 ° C, the growth of peppers stops, while at + 30 ° C and fluctuations in humidity, the ovary falls off.

Pepper has many other weak points that need attention from the gardener:

• heat-loving pepper dies at temperatures in the range of 0 … –5 ° С, however, the cold resistance of the plant can be increased by hardening the seeds and seedlings;

• plants are extremely sensitive to a lack of light, from this the fruits become smaller, and bitterness appears in sweet vegetable varieties;

• peppers are demanding on watering and air humidity, especially during flowering and ovary formation - a low level reduces yield, and also negatively affects the size of the fruit.

How to calculate everything

To obtain an early harvest, seeds are sown in late February - early March, since at the time of planting, seedlings grown in pots must be at least 65 days old, and the age of plants obtained without using pots is 50-55 days.

When sowing in greenhouses under a standard greenhouse frame for growing seedlings without picking, take 25-30 g of seeds, with a pick - 40-50 g.

Before sowing, the seeds are calibrated and sorted by specific gravity in a 5% salt solution. The floating seeds are thrown away, and the full-fledged ones are dried and prepared for sowing.

For seed germination, heat-loving pepper requires an air temperature of the above-soil layer of + 25 … + 27 ° С. In such conditions, seedlings are shown in a week and a half. When this value is at the level of + 15 … + 17 ° С, this period can last for a month. To increase the cold resistance of the seeds, the swollen seed is frozen for 2-3 days at a temperature of about 0 ° C. This can be done in the refrigerator or by burying it in the snow. Such seeds, in comparison with unhardened seeds, even with unfavorable weather changes, make it possible to harvest a week or two earlier, and produce 10-15% more products.

Seeds are planted in a greenhouse in rows, leaving about 5-7 cm aisles. The seeds are covered with a nutritious soil about 1 cm thick and are irrigated warmly. To create an optimal microclimate, the greenhouse is closed. It is recommended to lay out mice baits nearby so that the rodents do not destroy the seeds and seedlings.