I doubt it has anything to do with high nitrogen.

Even with high nitrogen, peppers will produce pods once the plant is appropriately sized.

When plants are stressed, they often flower and fruit in order to reproduce....because they
"think" they're about to die. Small containers will encourage stress-blooming, which isn't
good for the health of the plant. The heat can certainly compound problems, since the plants
will go semi-dormant when too hot...at which time, they won't be taking up moisture at the
normal rate, and so the roots sit in saturated soil, possibly rotting.

That said, peppers are on their own time-table. They flower and produce pods when ready.
My Hot Cherry, Black Pearl, Thai, and Hungarian Wax peppers are loaded with flowers and pods.
Other than my Chocolate Hab, none of the superhots are setting pods. My Arbol has one pod as of
two days ago, and my Tabasco isn't even flowering yet. Last year, didn't have Tabascos
until October.

Be patient. It'll happen.

Josh

I was thinking I really have to put the Hot Portugals in the garden, they are getting so tall I'm sure the 1-gal pot is too small for them now. Maybe the HH too, though those were supposed to be "compact" and I was thinking I could overwinter them inside. I can take some of the Thai out of the garden and swap them out with the porch peppers. I'm running out of room! The Thai seem to be a smaller variety (am I right?) and they're pretty, though not as rare as HH (which I wanted to save in case I can't find seed in the future), so maybe I'll overwinter them instead.

Funny, the Sweet Bananas just aren't doing well (first ones were in peat pots, I tore off the bottoms when transplanting but they just didn't seem to grow *down*, the roots were trying to get through the sides of the pots and just stopped when they hit the peat, didn't even curl around). Even the ones I took entirely out of the peat pots and planted directly in the garden. King of the North bells also grew very slowly, they were the smallest ones coming out of the greenhouse and most of them are still tiny though a few took off the past couple of weeks.

Rainbow Whopper bells are huge plants with no flowers. Depending on how they do, I may decide to just grow Chablis as the only bell and devote the rest of the garden to hot peppers next year. I'm very disappointed in King of the North, it was supposed to be good for cold climates, and June (other than a couple days at the beginning) was cool, but it was also wet. July has just been a scorcher the past 2 years (this year drier than last), if this is how New England weather is going to be from now on I'll have to switch to hot peppers! I figured too much N since I thought the heat should have "stressed" all the peppers in the garden into producing.

Thanks - we'll be patient (DH and DS did eat 1 green Hot Portugal from an Agway plant, said it was OK, hotter than a jalapeno but not terribly hot. I'm waiting for the porch Portugals to ripen.).

You can also sink your pots into the ground to help moderate temperature and moisture,
and also to allow the roots to escape the drainage holes and grow into the soil. Then you can
easily dig them up for the Winter, although you'll still want to replace the soil in the pot.

Many varieties of Thai are small and ornamental, indeed.

Good luck, keep us updated!

Josh

Hi Josh, I just checked and the "1-gal" pots are really 3-qt, the HH and 1 Thai (not the one that's fruiting?) are showing some roots through the drain holes. HPs seem to be OK but I might as well move them too since they're so tall they're going to need caging.

OK to move them with blossoms on them (I guess I could pick the fruit even though it's green, though the Thai are tiny yet)? Less/no shock if I bury them pot and all? Would it be better for the plant(s) if I remove the pot? I'm pretty sure I can get all the contents out in 1 piece, esp. if I *don't* water the pots right before. They're still moist from yesterday, and we're expecting rain today so I can let them have a little drink - move them away from the edge of the porch if it's heavy rain - and then transplant them tomorrow.

I just have to pull out (and pot) the smaller peppers from the garden since I am running out of room - 62 in the garden (along with 12 tomatoes, a couple of lettuce I have to pull, 3 cukes, 2 gourds, 2 yellow squash and 3 zukes in 400sf). Plus 8 on the porch and almost 2 dozen in 4-inch pots in front of the garage!

Thanks, Shelly

High nitrogen causes blossoms to drop once they are formed, it won't prevent formation.