Any time you want to. They are good any time. If you want to let them get red on the plant, they may be a little sweeter, but will probably decrease production of the plants from letting them get fully ripe on the plant. I would suggest that you sample some at various sizes to see what your preference is and pick accordingly. Bill P.

Well, I never have one favorite, but I probably can narrow it down to 3 or 4. I always like to let my peppers mature to their ripe color too. Blushing Beauty always produces well for me. If I transplant the plants into the ground in early to mid-May, I usually am harvesting in July. They are very heavy producers. I have to stake the plants early in the growing season or the weight of the peppers will bring them down to the ground. I think Blushing Beauty's DTM is about 70-72 days, but I think they produce in about 65 days in my garden. Another good one is Roumanian Rainbow, which produces ripe peppers about a week earlier in my garden than Blushing Beauty. For really early peppers (although they barely beat Roumanian Rainbow), I grow the Mini Belle Blend from Totally Tomatoes. They produce in slightly less than two months from their transplant date, and produce heavily all summer long. The plants are supposed to be 24" tall, but they sometimes get 3' or taller in my garden. Last year, I planted Renee's Garden Seeds' blended packet that had three varieties (a red, an orange and a yellow) in one seed packet. The seeds are dyed with food coloring so you know which seed produces which color pepper. They were healthy, produced heavily all summer long and the peppers were tasty. I've linked them below and intend to grow them again this year. (For what it is worth, every vegetable variety from Renee's that I've ever planted has performed in an absolutely perfect manner. Clearly Renee has high standards and chooses what she feels are the best varieties available, and it shows in how well they perform.) I grew Yummy Orange (a sweet non-bell) from a purchased transplant for the first time last year and liked it so much that I ordered seeds of Yummy to grow this year. Totally Tomatoes has Yummy Orange and Yummy Mix. All the 'Beauty' line have done very well here today, especially 'Chocolate Beauty' and 'Purple Beauty'. And, I always grow 'Lilac" for its gorgous color and great flavor. I start my pepper seed long with my tomato seeds on Super Bowl Sunday, which usually is the first Sunday in February. I don't transplant the peppers out into the garden until about 2 weeks after I set out all the tomatoes, which means the peppers probably make it into the ground the first week of May most years. (I have to wait for my last frost, which has been consistently hitting us on May 3rd the last 3 or 4 years, even though our so-called "average last frost" date is March 27th.) So, while I may transplant tomatoes into the ground in mid-April and cover them up on cold nights, I keep the peppers inside until those cold nights pass. Pepper plants, if exposed to temperatures in the 40s for even a fairly brief period, can stall and remain unproductive for weeks and weeks or even months. I use a meat thermometer (not the same one I use in the kitchen!)to check my soil temperature at planting depth and don't plant until my soil is at or above 55 degrees for 3 or 4 days in a row. Since exposure to cool temperatures can have such a drastic effect on a pepper's productivity long after it is transplanted into the ground, I keep my peppers inside on the plant shelf long after the tomato transplants are hardening off on the back porch. Even when the peppers come outside during the day to harden off, I put them back inside before temps drop very much in the evening. I've found that makes a real difference in how well they produce. I hope this info helps in some way. Dawn Here is a link that might be useful: Renee's Jewel Tone Sweet Bell Mix

chris, I am no pepper expert but I do plant a large variety of them. I planted Bell, Habs, Jalapeno, cayenne, sweat banana and hot banana in the same bed this year. I used straw ground cover. Rain was scarce at the beginning of the season so I watered about every third day, but not alot of water. As the rain picked up, I quit watering all together. All of the plants are producing more than I can keep up with. However, the sweat bananas turn a brownish color more than 50% of the time, as the other types, included hot banana, do not. I am not sure, but I don't think the water requirement or soil requirement is any different than the rest of the peppers. Apperantly, they are just a more finicky pepper. To help with the BER, put down some lime before planting next year. Also, feeding with MiracleGro plant food once a week does wonders! I can tell you they do not like cooler weather but Direct sunlight ALL day should be avoided in my experience. Habs however seem to ike as much direct sunlight as they can get. Hope some of this helps.

I was sick this season so I didn't get to keep the garden size I usually keep, but I do have a -very- limited amount of seed. I've already sourced over 1/2 of it locally. I have enough for 4-5 mailings of 4-5 seeds. I also have the spare postage from the earlier offer to send it out without a SASE. I'll hold 2 of these for ferret/bdan for a while. Email me at pepperdude@live.com and be sure to tell me your GardenWeb nickname along with it. I had issues with this past offer making other boards and getting a ton of requests from people who were only hording seed. It wasn't a big deal, but there's not enough to go around this time.