What is the ratio of soap to water? Can it be any brand of soap? I have heard that it should be Castille soap but have not been able to find any. Thanks.

Slugs and snails love peppers. I keep a pepper plant in my orchid house as a "magnet plant" so that I can go out at night and remove any slugs that I find there. But really, your pepper in your photo looks quite good. You're not going to have pristine foliage and it isn't necessary. Sometimes the predation is so heavy that the leaves are almost skeletonized and the plants photosynthetic ability is diminished. Then you've got problems. You might also have leaf-cutting bees. They leave holes but it's not typically catastrophic damage.

FWIW, like Dave suggests, as long as the plants don't lose more than 1/3 of total foliage, they'll likely be ok. That damage looks healed over already & I don't see any holes in the new growth. That said, it may be cutworm or another similar caterpillar - they hide during the day. Cutworms burrow into loose soil/mulch around the base of plants & 'sleep' during the day. Bt can be used against caterpillars, but handpicking is often enough to control them in my garden. You can use iron phosphate bait for slugs & snails - it's pretty safe & degrades into fertilizer. I sprinkle the pellets around my tender new seedlings & transplants.

Hi Everyone, I appreciate the input. So apparently I wasn't paying enough attention to the weather--we had another heat wave and the plants are heavily wilting in the afternoons. It's hard for me to say if the leaf damage is the result of the heat or the small bug--I'm guessing it's the heat. I'm going to keep watching this and see how things develop. I also looked up our County Extension office and might head over there as well. Thanks again!