My mother adored pepper—black, red, green, hot, sweet, any kind. She used so much cracked pepper in our meals that most of them looked as if they were dug out of a gravel pit. I used to sulkily scrape it off while she told me I didn't know what was good.
Times and tastes have changed, though. After spending time in Ghana 50 years ago, I learned to appreciate pepper. I had to. Everything was covered with it, from roasted chicken and rice to pineapple chunks. It was either develop a liking for it or starve.
I had never understood why pepper was popular in hot climates. But I found out. When I consumed it, I would break out into a sweat and start to shiver. That cooled me off! I developed a taste for the spicy flavor, but the air conditioning effect was certainly an inducement.
Peppers are classified as either hot or sweet, but there is some crossover thanks to modern plant breeding. The bell pepper (Capsicum annuum) is a member of the nightshade family (Solanaceae) and is a sweet pepper. While some nightshades are poisonous (henbane and jimson weed), others are grown commercially. Tomatoes, eggplant and potatoes are some of those valuable plants.
When the New World natives gave Christopher Columbus some spicy hot berries (peppers), he thought the fruits had economic potential. He took them back to Europe, where they have been cultivated since 1493.
There are four other domesticated species of peppers—C. chinense, C. frutescens, C. baccatum and C. pubescens, according to the Chile Pepper Institute of New Mexico State University. However, Capsicum annuum is the species with the most varieties, including hot and sweet. The New Mexican jalapeño and the poblano are just two of them. Botanically, peppers are considered berries because they develop from a single ovary and their seeds are embedded in their flesh.
I like bell peppers very much. They are flavorful and can be eaten raw, or cooked in a variety of ways, or even dried. They also make attractive containers for rice, meat or other foods. A red bell pepper contains more vitamin C than an orange. And they are easy to grow in Napa Valley's warm climate.
Producing your own starts from seeds is the most economical way to grow any vegetable. For peppers, all you need is an undisturbed sunny space—or a table and a grow light—and you are in business. Peppers need six to eight hours of sunlight a day.
You should start your seeds in a sterile seedling mix, available at any nursery. If you are planting the seeds in plastic planting trays, put three seeds in each cell. If they all sprout, you can thin the seedlings later, but it's good to have extras.
Start pepper seedlings about 10 weeks before the nights warm up, which is typically late April in Napa Valley. Peppers take more time to germinate than other vegetable seeds.
You might need to put a heating mat under the tray if your room is sunny but cold. Don't let the seedling mix dry out, but don't overwater either, or your seedlings may rot. The soil should have the dampness of a wrung-out sponge.
You can transplant your seedlings when they are about eight inches tall and showing bud formation, but you should harden them off for a week first. “Hardening off” is garden lingo for gradually acclimatizing them to life outdoors. Take them outside for short periods at first, protecting them from direct sun and gradually increasing the time outdoors. They should be ready to transplant in a week, so long as the nighttime temperature is 50°F or above.
The UC Master Gardener handbook suggests intercropping with pepper plants. This practice involves planting vegetables with shorter days-to-maturity (such as spinach) in rows next to peppers, which take longer to reach full size. With intercropping, you can plant more vegetables in a given space.
I know an avid gardener who plants peppers all over her yard as an accent plant. The pepper shrubs are as pretty as flowers, especially when the fruits ripen.
Peppers need loose, well-draining soil to avoid root rot. They are more susceptible to disease if grown in the same spot as another nightshade was the year before. Crop rotation is always a good practice, but especially so with peppers.
Whiteflies, thrips and aphids like to attack pepper plants. You can respond with lady beetles (ladybugs) and horticultural oils and soaps or just rinse the leaves with water in the morning.
If you would like to learn more about growing peppers, the UC Master Gardeners of Napa County will have a free Library Talk on Thursday, January 2. See details below.
Library Talk: Join UC Master Gardeners of Napa County for a Napa Library talk on “Growing Peppers” on Thursday, January 2, from 7 pm to 8 pm via Zoom. Let's parlez peppers—hot, sweet and mild. Learn the basics of starting peppers from seed, plus growing tips and usage ideas for your eventual harvest. Click here to register!
Rose Pruning Workshop: Join UC Master Gardeners of Napa County for a workshop on “Winter Rose Care” on Saturday, January 11, from 10 a.m. to noon, via Zoom. Learn pruning techniques for all types of roses along with everything you need to know to make your roses a success in 2025. Attendees will be invited to a hands-on pruning workshop at Fuller Park Rose Garden on January 18 to practice what they learned. Register here.
QWEL Training: Napa County landscape and irrigation pros are encouraged to become Qualified Water Efficient Landscapers (QWEL). Earn this EPA WaterSense award-winning professional certification and save water and money for clients. The City of Napa is sponsoring free in-person QWEL training in English on four Wednesdays starting January 15. Space is limited. Register at qwel.net/pub/class/491.
Help Desk: The Master Gardener Help Desk is available to answer your garden questions on Mondays and Fridays from 10 am until 1 pm at the University of California Cooperative Extension Office, 1710 Soscol Avenue, Suite 4, Napa. Or send your questions to mastergardeners@countyofnapa.org. Include your name, address, phone number and a brief description of the problem.
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