I would tend to agree with you about the 54 degrees thing. Anything below 70 will cause pepper seedlings to have stunted growth & they will never be the same again. I tried putting mine out in a cold frame when temps were getting high enough last year. A little bit of cold destroyed every single one of them. Could also be a fungus though. Pinch off the bad leaves, get them warmer & give them a few days to see what happens. - Steve

Undoubtedly the organic potting soil contained herbicide residue of some sort, probably something from the picolinic acid (aka pyridine-2-carboxylic acid) group. Herbicides from this group tend to include one or more of these active ingredients: picloram, aminopyralid, aminocyclopyrachlor or clopyralid. These herbicides generally are sprayed on grain crops to kill broadleaf weeds. Unfortunately the herbicide residue can survive the digestive tract of animals that eat the grains and the herbicides can survive composting. This problem is referred to as herbicide carryover and a common nickname for it is killer compost. It has been a persistent (no pun intended) problem since around 2000, when it popped up in both Pennsylvania and Washington State. Herbicide carryover damages and kills many gardens every year. Herbicide carryover even has been found in commercially-sold bagged organic composted manure products. When the state agency in that case tried to work backwards to determine how the composted manure became contaminated, they learned that the horses who supplied the manure had been fed a famous-name bagged horse feed containing ingredients apparently grown with one of those persistent herbicides. As far as I know, that was the first case where commercially bagged animal feed was contaminated with the herbicide. It is much more common for hay to be contaminated since those herbicides are sprayed on hay and other grain fields. So, am I surprised this happened to you? Nope, it happens, and it does not get a lot of media attention. If you are sure that your potting soil was herbicide-contaminated, you should contact the manufacturer and let them know. If there is a batch number or other identifying info on the bag, you might want to let them know. Here's more on herbicide carryover from the U. S. Composting Council: Persistent Herbicide

Thanks guys! Replying to both comments: 1) Yes they look better on camera than in real life. I did not test soil, it's a part of routine fertilizing I do every year, didn't have problems before, applied according instruction 1 cup per 10x10 ft. There were high winds along with storms, very high winds I'd say, like 50+ mph. 2) I use castile soap diluted in water 5 tbsp per 1 gal. Thanks!

The only thing you might have done differently, Rick, was to plant quite a few more or stuffed them in between other plants...because C.bells are notorious for throwing more flower spikes than they can reasonably expect to support. Once the blooms appear, the weight of the stem will become even more overloaded. In my view, these are not gardenworthy plants and should really only be grown in rows for cutting. However, you are, rightly, wanting to preserve the ones you already have so it is not too late to use either peasticks, woody prunings or thin canes around the plant, with string or twine wound between the existing stems. The main requirement now is for support, above all else. Growgirl, the main bloom cycle is pretty much the only one. Cutting back may encourage a few sideshoots to form (as with foxgloves) but really, they are best yanked out after blooming so you can use the space to plant next years biennials (which should have been sown anytime in May). The foliage is not worth saving either, as it will look increasingly tatty whether cut back or not. Biennials have a place between the spring bulbs and the first summer perennials - I grow dianthus, verbascum, wallflowers, foxgloves and lunaria for this very purpose (and when I can be bothered, I also grow the chimney bellflower, campanula pyramidalis as a companion for the tall lilies)...but nearly always, they are brilliant for cutting or relatively short-lived but massively enthusiastic bloom power...which is why they tend to be biennial rather than short-lived perennials - because they bloom themselves to death. A single lunaria, 'Corfu Blue', produced a 4foot by 4foot shrub-like cloud of deep blue flowers for a month in May/June which was stunning, if ephemeral. Great in a wilder garden too.