Topic: Rocota peppers

[Jeannine]

Has anyone got any experience with them please XX Jeannine

[Jayb]

Rocoto?  I'm growing one from Real Seeds called Alberto’s Locoto http://www.realseeds.co.uk/hotpeppers.html. Sorry not much help from me as I only started it off Jan/Feb time. Hopefully someone with more experience of these will be along soon. But if it is of interest- I had 1 out of 2 seeds germinate and so far it has made a delightful plant, still quite compact with beautifully dark green leaves. It has just started flowering, the most intense purple colour.  I’m planning on bringing it into the house in the autumn to overwinter, and plan on saving a seed for spares and in case of mishap  :P

[Bugloss2009]

I grow the rocoto pepper. I have an overwintered orange one in the garden now. It's about 3 feet tall and quite shrubby. Just coming into flower. Fruit is reasonably large and hot. Nice grilled stuffed with cream cheese. overwinters quite well, though i did find with the last one I grew that it didn;t grow much bigger in the second year than it did in the first (I was expecting i to get much bigger). Nice plant, flowers are pretty, and of course the leaves are hairy.

[Jeannine]

Yes, that is the one. Over here they describe it as very hot.. wimps!!

I  just realised  I had the seeds, a bit  too late I guess, although maybe if I bring the young  plant in as I did with my Pepperdews I would have a head start on next year.

I found the Pepperdews didn't put on as much growth as I expected so I am repotting them into much bigger self watering pots today..we built them just last night so I am hoping that helps.

Good to see there are a couple of you.

Jayb...is there NOTHING I can give you that yoiu don't already have, I was going to send some of these to you LOL

Have you grown Arrowhead yet!!

XX Jeannine

[Bugloss2009]

i've got into the habit of sowing chilis in late summer, and overwintering them as small plants to give a head start. haven't had any die in the winter and certainly it works with the rocoto. Only problem is watching for greenfly, but that's the same as for early Spring sowings

[George the Pigman]

I am very interested in these peppers as I didn't realise you could get the seed. We were on holiday in Peru last year and had them stuffed with cheese - apparently a speciality of the area of Arequepa! They were lovely!
It says in this link http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capsicum_pubescens
that they can withstand cooler temperatures than ordinary peppers so starting a bit late might not be a problem and also explains why they can be overwintered in the UK.
Where did you get the seed?

[Bugloss2009]

they are well worth growing. Nickys Seeds have them in red orange and yellow, I think, and maybe as a mixture, and like I said you can sow them in late summer and overwinter. They may be called Manzano chilis........

[no-lottie]

I recently grew (our summer) Rocoto Jaune, a yellow mild/warm tasting rocoto, which was a popular give away to friends and I have a Rocoto Tree Chilli plant that I received late in the season which is sitting through our Winter here at the moment, the fruit from it untasted as yet, but it should ripen closer the Oct/Nov when the weather warms.

[Bugloss2009]

by the way george the pigman, overwintering chilis isn't too difficult, it's a bit trial and error, but a lot are no problem at all. annuum ones can struggle for instance, but a lot of the hot ones are easy

[Jeannine]

I wasn't aware that they came in colours other than red, are they the same thing I wonder..bit of googling needed here I think. Mine came from SSE in the US XX Jeannine

Had a google and there are several colours, some sites say they are related to the red one and some assume they are the same.. but anyway they are available in several colours, It will be interesting to compare after growth to see if there is a differnce.

XX Jeanniune

[artichoke]

Hello, Jeannine: your mention of self-watering pots caught my eye. I have about 8 of these things bought from Lidl in UK. I am very pleased with them and would love some  more. I have asked a USA company if they have outlets in UK and they say they don't, neither can they supply them internationally. Do you know of any outlets in UK for self-watering pots?

[artichoke]

And about overwintering chillis: I only learnt last year that this could be done, and as I had a spindly seedling given to me in autumn, I kept it in the house. It has grown enormously, has been flowering heavily for weeks, and is starting to set chillis. It is still indoors, as it looks very attractive.

[goodlife]

Jeannine..does these self watering pots have 'false' bottom inside..sort of 'pot inside a pot' with a tube to go into the resevour that you fill it from.? There is holes punctured on the inner bottom for the roots.
I remember using that sort of pots in Finland for house plants but never seen them sale in UK.
I forgot all about them!..now that you reminded me..they would be quite easy to make. Although the 'proper ones' does looke really neat..
I've got some Peppadews in GH border at the moment and they are now nearly a foot high..not flowering yet..so they should grow much taller.

[Hector]

We have got some self watering pots but seldom see them in garden centres. When we do it tends to be those long troughs. I'm in a caravan but I'll look at make when we get back.

We have made some of our own by cutting short lengths of white water pipe (rigid from B&Q).  I glued them onto a scrap of marine ply that was trimmed to be almost flush with pot...so a wee square on legs, so we had a reservoir below)...made a hole/cut off a wee bit of corner...then a taller bit of water pipe goes down from top  of put into reservoir. We used this for a bedding plant planter.

[artichoke]

I made one once from two large plastic bins. It took ages of clumsy cutting and drilling, and looked quite nasty (but worked surprisingly well)! I'm sure almost anyone else could make a better job of it. They are SO much better for growing things in conventional pots which one can never quite water enough. Lidl does not stock them any more here, but I am very glad I went mad for them when they did (only about £3 - £5 each, compared to buying 2 big plastic bins and cutting fingers off trying to deal with them). Gave two to daughter, sadly, and she  had monster cucumbers out of them, and loads of tomatoes.

I will look at garden centres in case they have started stocking them.

[Jeannine]

Ok. first off, we made our selfd watering containers, yoiu need 2 5 gallon buckets a 2 foot length of 1 1/2 inch rigid white watyer pipe and a plastic coffee cup and a bit of black plastic or a plastic shower cap..You also need potting soil, Dolomite lime and a good fertiliser. Once made up you don't have to feed  anymore. They are callede Global buckets and there is a site with info and a video telling you how to make them.

http://globalbuckets.org

Secondly, you can make Earthtainer boxes with plastic Rubbermaid containers, the storage containers with lids. There is a site  for those too. There area also viseos on the net,

http://earthtainer.tomatofest.com



Thirdly you can buy the commercial version of the homemade containers in the UK, I know because I saw it listed only a few days ago. They are called Earthboxes, they have retailers all; over the UK including garden organic at Ryton

http://www.earthbox.com



XX Jeannine

[Jeannine]

R above, if you go the Eartbox site, lookm at the link for retailers and tap in the UK,

On Tomatofest scroll down till yoiu come to Earthtainers.

They seem expensive but actually pay off big time in the long run. The scoop on the homemde versus the commercial is the quality of the plastic used. Due to UV rays the homemade ones havea linited life but the commnercail onbes are made from a high grade plastic that is guaranteed, so the sherlflife is much much longer.

I am buying commercial Earthboxes for next year to complement my Global Buckets as they are much bigger and I can grow anything in them, even sweetcorn.

XX Jeannine

PS sorry for all the typos but my arms are really bad today and I am having trouble typing, when this happens I often hit two keys at the same time.. sorry but I think it is readable.

[artichoke]

Thanks a lot, Jeannine and I'm sorry about your arms.

I forgot to say I knew about Earthboxes but ignored them because they are so expensive. It's interesting that you consider them well worth the money. The Lidl ones are a fraction of the price and this is the second year I am using them - I don't know how long they will last.

If anyone else is interested, I got from Amazon "Incredible vegetables from self-watering containers" by Edward Smith. It was not an expensive book and has a huge amount of information about the soil mix and which veg benefit from being grown in this way.

The USA company I got in touch with makes a porous "floor" that can be fitted into any pots you already have - a shame they cannot be found here in UK.

Having three half-size allotments, I have plenty of ground to grow things in, so these are for a small back yard - all allotments are riddled with tomato blight, so I try to grow tomatoes at home, along with salad crops.

[grawrc]

I have a yellow overwintered rocoto that I got in a seed swap here. About to go outside for a couple of months.

[Vinlander]

The USA company I got in touch with makes a porous "floor" that can be fitted into any pots you already have - a shame they cannot be found here in UK.

I've had a 'porous floor' in my greenhouse for nearly 20 years - it's a 6x8ft one and I just:

Dug a hole the size of a toilet cistern in the far corner.

Laid black plastic DPC across the floor (got rid of stones first).

Put a few gallons of water in the dent where the hole was to settle it in.

Trimmed the plastic to leave a raised 100mm lip all around the walls.

Put some old capillary matting all round the hole so it reached the bottom and spread 200mm around it.

Put bricks on top of the mat to make a surround for the hole.

Used all last years growbags spread out over the whole floor up to the bricks - about 20-30mm deep.

Finally mounted a ball-thingy from an old toilet so it floated in the hole at the right level.

Connected to the mains water thro ordinary hose (buried) via a tap that allows me to set a trickle feed (in case the pipe bursts or is chewed).

I have never had any problem with it - even when away for 3 weeks. Even helps to keep the red spider down - a self-damping floor!

Saves so much time...

BTW - don't use agri-fabric cover - eventually you will forget to move a pot and it will root through the fabric and run a metre in every direction - its easier to let them run thro the damp layer because when you lift them there's just a big hole you fill with more growbag. A lot easier than disentangling 5 sqm of fabric!

Cheers.