My advice is to not buy plants. all too often they are not the variety marked. for me I have missed on almost all being wrong. Plant seeds and get the correct variety that grows like you want them to grow. One big thing is that plants are usually NOT f1 hybrids. The growers of plants all too often save seeds and give you later generations that just do not perform. you must buy high quality seeds and grow your own to get the correct plants. The growers of plants all too often use inferior seeds. they tend to make their own seeds and get the seeds and the plants mixed up. it makes for random plants. Just my experience. I wonder how many people above bought plants instead of good seeds.

Sorry, I forgot to post where I am which is zone 6. 1. Yes, I do see a lot of the lower leaves have soil build up on them. 2. Im not really sure why that part of the soil would be much different than the rest. I turned over and mixed that whole area a few weeks before planting. Should I try adding used coffee ground and/or egg shells around its base? 3. I had to start over after my first attempt. Something ate the plants when I planted them. Which is why there aren't as big as you would expect. 4.I know they would need a bigger pot to actually grow. I didn't give them much attention after I took the strong plants to put in the soil. Actually, didn't even expect them to grow at all with the way I left them in the pot. ( I actually have one growing in a pot with potting soil, that I believe is 5 gallon. That one was doing well. Now it is recovering from being over watered ) 5 The peppers wouldn't benefit from being spread out and put into soil, over only spreading them out in the pots? No, I am not using potting soil. Didn't know there was a difference and used garden soil. The only reason the tomato has potting soil, is because I planted it the pot from a fig tree I purchased. Thank you for the response

njitgrad: Never had a problem with wilting before in 4 years so I doubt the containers are too hot for the roots. Just because things were fine before doesn't mean they're going to be fine now. Conditions differ every year. If you make your 5-1-1 fresh every year, there could be a difference in the particle size/absorbency of the materials you use, etc. I always water them heavily with each watering. When I say heavily I mean until water seeps out of all sides of the containers including the bottom. Probably about 2 gallons of water per plant. It depends on the rate of watering. If you dump a lot of water quickly, much of it may run off without hydrating the mix properly. Also, if the mix is getting too dry in between waterings, it doesn't matter how much you water when you do water. 5-1-1 is a well-draining mix, so it won't hold onto a lot of water. It's not like growing in-ground. So excess water does nothing, just drains away. The key is enough water at the optimum frequency. A ton of water but not often enough will still lead to drought stress if you're growing in containers with a well-draining mix. I understand that it's frustrating that what you did before is not having the same good results today, but it doesn't really help your plants to reject advice because what you were doing before worked before. It's obviously not working now for some of your plants.

The stalk borers don't usually attack fruit. it's really common for fruitworm or other caterpillars to get inside fruit, though. Fruitworm moths usually lay their eggs around the calyx,and the baby fruitworms bore in under protection there, and the larger holes you see elsewhere in the fruit that look like perfect holes are usually their exit holes. If you're seeing a lot of those, start spraying BT up under the sepals of developing fruit. Caterpillars that attack from the outside in vs from the inside out usually don't leave deep holes but leave damage to the outer wall of the fruit. Next time you cut off a branch that looks like it might have a borer in it, split it lengthwise to see whether there's debris inside consistent with frass. Or you may even come across the borer. You probably know this already, but the borers that affect tomatoes (and corn and other plants) are dull brown/gray moths. They're not the same species that attack squash plants.