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pepper update, September 7
Sep. 7th, 2015 10:53 pmIt's been a long time since I made a pepper post, hasn't it? Anyway, these are photos from Sunday the 6th. As you can see, the older peppers are either about ready to be picked or making a second attempt to bloom after their woes in Ithaca's way-too-rainy early and mid-summer.
My younger peppers are making their first attempt to bloom, and in more than half the cases, are succeeding. There are a couple that got warped by pesticide (I must remember in future to spray only lower leaves and not the growing tip of the plants), and some others that were hurt by the same excess rain problem, but the majority are doing fine.
My main takeaway from all this is that A) I should invest in terracotta pots rather than plastic ones, because they really are just that much better in terms of drainage -- check out the color difference between the plants on the left and the plants on the right in the top photo for proof -- and B) that the peppers sheltered by the mulberry tree did notably better than the others, though I'm not sure whether the shade or the natural umbrella effect was the more relevant part of that shelter.
link to photos on Tumblr (because Tumblr is awful and will break the links if I try to embed them over here; I speak from long and frustrated experience)
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And then I picked two peppers, chopped them up, and tossed them in my crockpot with some yellow squash, onion, and various spices. The mix should be done cooking in... eh, let's say another hour. It's not quite the same as my previous attempt at slow-cooked vegetable side-dish -- that one included, IIRC, some residual tomato water I drained from a can of tomatoes and then froze for later use -- but it smells all right so far. :D
link to photos on Tumblr
My younger peppers are making their first attempt to bloom, and in more than half the cases, are succeeding. There are a couple that got warped by pesticide (I must remember in future to spray only lower leaves and not the growing tip of the plants), and some others that were hurt by the same excess rain problem, but the majority are doing fine.
My main takeaway from all this is that A) I should invest in terracotta pots rather than plastic ones, because they really are just that much better in terms of drainage -- check out the color difference between the plants on the left and the plants on the right in the top photo for proof -- and B) that the peppers sheltered by the mulberry tree did notably better than the others, though I'm not sure whether the shade or the natural umbrella effect was the more relevant part of that shelter.
link to photos on Tumblr (because Tumblr is awful and will break the links if I try to embed them over here; I speak from long and frustrated experience)
-----
And then I picked two peppers, chopped them up, and tossed them in my crockpot with some yellow squash, onion, and various spices. The mix should be done cooking in... eh, let's say another hour. It's not quite the same as my previous attempt at slow-cooked vegetable side-dish -- that one included, IIRC, some residual tomato water I drained from a can of tomatoes and then froze for later use -- but it smells all right so far. :D
link to photos on Tumblr
