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Vegetable Gardening

My pepper plants -overwatered? Over fertilized?

11 years ago

Help please! I grew peppers from seed in March. All has been well. Then I started to give them some nutrients because they were looking pale. I used diluted Neptune fish/seaweed. They have been sitting in flats on brick steps in full sun.

Last week (perhaps longer) it turned cool, with weather in the 50s/low 60s high, and overnight lows in low 50s. One night was 48. Cool days, cloudy. I gave them their last watering Friday. I think I overdid it.

Yesterday (Sunday), I noticed several plants with wilting leaves. It was rainy and cool (50s), so I moved them under cover.

But when I checked this morning, there was more wilting, and it seems they are waterlogged. The wilting leaves doop straight down. A few of the plants had fuzzy mold developing on the soil surface in their cell. What I don't know is whether the wilting/drooping leaves are from being waterlogged, over fertilized, or both.

Is there anything I can do to save them? I brought them inside, put them in the bathroom with a space heater in hopes that will help to dry them out.

I have 25 - 30 plants...in either 4" or ~3 x1.5" cell packs. It's 60 outside now, raining and we'll have no sun or warm weather until Thursday.

Advice appreciated!

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Comments (3)

eetchickn
11 years ago
Do they look like this?

Here is a link that might be useful: Damping off
ditnc
Original Author
11 years ago
Yes, but not to that extreme. Individual leaves just going vertically downward. They still have good leaves as well. Too late to revive? Thnx.
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ditnc
Original Author
11 years ago
Well, I googled damping off of peppers, and it doesn't sound good.

Trying to decide whether to segregate those with wilts from those that don't, throw the ones with wilted leaves away, or try to dry them all out in the bathroom with the space heater and hope for the best.

It was a lot of work getting them to this point...I'm pretty bummed out...

I can't figure out where it came from. I used new cell packs, brand new seed starter mix, etc. All was fine until they got wet and the weather turned cool. :(

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