I don't know about transplant shock in this case; all I can add is that I up-potted two Jwala plants in early fruiting stage and that didn't stop them. That was a couple of weeks back. But now, I have the same "issue" of most flowers dropping. I'm thinking my plants simply have enough pods to support and don't want to produce more for the moment. Perhaps you have a similar thing going on.

If your temps are 90+ degrees that could cause flower drop. I would not use Epsom salt as a spray, and only add to soil during watering if there is a magnesium deficiency. Transplant shock/stress could happen and cause flowers to fall.

Here's a picture i took a few minutes ago. You can see towards the top some of the flowers are a little pale..

I'm in Southern California where it's been really sunny, but the temps are about 80 to 85 degrees..

About the epsom salt, i've read a lot of articles and watched a ton of videos that say peppers like lots of magnesium and it's good for peppers to do use it a few times a month.

Now I'm conflicted..

http://www.gardeningknowhow.com/garden-how-to/soil-fertilizers/epsom-salt-gardening.htm

I have grow a cayenne type (Big Thai Hybrid) for the last couple of years and, yes, I get some blossom drop. I think there's a point where it has set so much fruit that it will stop setting new until the current batch of peps is completed. It wasn't a very long pause in production, and the good news is that cayennes tend to produce lots, all season long, so concentrate on giving the plant consistent water and sun so it can thrive.

I don't use Epsom salts, the only benefit they give is magnesium, which I can give them via most liquid fertilizers because it's a micronutrient and it doesn't take much, and you run the real risk of damaging the plant with too much. Also, massive doses of magnesium can displace the calcium in the medium, which can eventually lead to blossom end rot. If you are using the right kind of fertilizer for containers (which have no/very limited microbial action, and thus cannot "digest" most organic fertilizers) then you can usually get the plant all the micronutrients it needs. A lot of people choose to use some kind of liquid fertilizer in containers because it is faster-acting and because container plants tend to use up the nutrients faster than in-ground ones.

The pot is a 12" pot that's maybe a foot deep. I have a ton of potted peppers so I don't want them to get too big so that's why I'm limiting the size of the pots plus I want to overwinter as many as I can(to see how it goes and which survive)

For fertilizer, when I first pot them I mix in a tiny amount of worm castings into the soil.. then every other week I use diluted fish fertilizer with arrowhead water. I'm in SoCal so the tap water is pretty bad.. high chlorine and fluoride.

My first set of potted plants I accidentally used garden soil which has those slow release nitrogen balls so in those pots, I tossed in a few pinches of bone meal to combat the high nitrogen with phosphorus. In those pots, for awhile my plants were nice and bushy, lush green but every one of the flowers are dropping so I'm hoping upping the phosphorus a bit helps them. This cayenne isn't in that garden soil, its in potting soil.

After a few videos on youtube and some articles on the internet about epsom salt as a foliar spray, i tried it couple times but haven't use it since for a few weeks now.

Limiting the volume of soil limits the size of the plant. Limiting the size of the plant limits the amount of peppers it can sustain. Fish fertilizer is very high in N relative P and K and this triggered the plant for foliar growth, but too much N can prevent the plant from switching to setting fruit when it normally would.

People who choose to overwinter generally do so by yanking the plants out of their pots, cutting both the root ball and the top growth way back, sticking that into a smaller pot for the winter, then repotting into a bigger pot for the growing season. Your chosen pot might do for a slower growing C. chinense like a habanero or a reaper, but cayenne varieties grow fast and big and need a lot of root for roots.

Worm castings contain very limited amounts of nutrients. Both they and bone meal will break down in potting soil, but it will take a long, long time because both depend on microbial action to do so. Microbial activity is either limited or missing entirely from containers due to the highly fluctuating environment. The container gardening forum here has lots of discussion about good choices of container fertilizers, both organic and synthetic. The general consensus is that the purely organic route is possible but takes more effort and money.

I have similar problems with tap water. If you fill the watering can, bucket, whatever and let it sit out, uncovered, for a day or so a lot of the bad stuff will offgas. Cheaper than buying bottled water, which is way less regulated than your tap water and may contain who knows what...

Good call on the garden soil, though. The stuff tends to compact in containers and will starve the roots of oxygen.

Epsom salts (magnesium sulfate) are one of the myths that the Internet (and the seller) loves to propagate as a miracle fix-all cure, but in reality they may only solve one problem (magnesium deficiency) that is really not all that commonly occurring to begin with. Foliar application does no good because the plants do not absorb magnesium through their leaves. There's a good discussion over at the Growing Tomatoes forum right now about the kind of damage ill-informed application of Epsom salts can do to tomato plants. Pepper plants are in the same family as tomatoes. If you do a bit of research you can find any one of many good fertilizers that contain more than enough magnesium.

Not trying to harsh your mellow, bring you down, etc., just speaking from experience so that you can avoid making the kinds of mistakes I, and many others, have already made.

One more note on your pot - that terra cotta is porous to both air and water and you'll find that as a result your potting medium will dry out much faster than in a plastic pot. Which could be another stresser to the plant, already in a small pot.

Thanks for the advice. I understand that NPK are the macronutrients and the rest are the micronutrients. Nitrogen for larger foliage, phosphorus for more/bigger flowers and potassium for overall health of the plant. All of my plants are real healthy looking.. only the ones in the garden soil haven't started producing yet which I'm guessing is because of the higher nitrogen.. Not real sure what to do.. I can attempt to repot them and add in some vermiculite or repot and replace the soil with potting soil.. I'm just hoping that through regular watering that the nitrogen gels get washed down and they start producing..

Well, variety makes a difference in when they start flowering and setting fruit. My cayennes and Early Jalapeno were blooming even before they were potted in their final places for the summer, but I have some that are still making leaves and not even a hint of a bloom yet. If you have duplicate plants, such that the same variety is growing in potting soil and garden soil, you could make an experiment out of it and compare when and how they hit their growth milestones.

Your call. Repotting can be stressful, but then so is a slow death due to root death by soil compaction. If the plants are about the size of the photo plant, you may be able to repot them into potting soil. Just don't do it in the heat of the day, try as best as possible not to damage the roots, and be prepared to give them shade if they look wilty.

And while I'm thinking of it, there's room in that terra cotta pot to add potting soil. Right up to 1/2 below the rim of the pot. Every little bit helps.

Yeah I know some of the hotter ones like my reapers and scorpions are late bloomers.. people were saying theirs weren't blooming until august or even september.

What I'm curious about is the reason I haven't harvested those Cayennes is because I'm expecting them to start turning red.. right now they just appear to be getting bigger and bigger and none have even a slight hint of turning colors going on. I know I can harvest them now but I love hot peppers so I figured I'd let them turn red..

The plant in your pic is rather sparse foliage wise and probably can't support any more peppers at the moment. Hence why it is dropping blooms. Is it in full sun?

It was already said but even when used in the garden bone meal takes a while to break down and become usable by plants. In a container it's going to take even longer. It is not a quick acting fertilizer. Worm castings are also fairly useless in containers. You should try to find a more balanced liquid organic fertilizer than fish fert.

"only the ones in the garden soil haven't started producing yet which I'm guessing is because of the higher nitrogen."

It's because they are in garden soil which compacts and causes drainage and watering issues that they aren't producing yet. It has nothing to do with nitrogen. Take the plants out and repot them into fresh potting mix. The plants should respond fairly quickly.

"What I'm curious about is the reason I haven't harvested those Cayennes is because I'm expecting them to start turning red.. right now they just appear to be getting bigger and bigger and none have even a slight hint of turning colors going on. I know I can harvest them now but I love hot peppers so I figured I'd let them turn red."

So they are doing what they are supposed to. At some point they will stop growing and starting turning color. However, they are hot when they are both green and red. The taste is somewhat different but the heat is there.

Rodney

Yeah it's in full sun.. I haven't pruned this at all either.. I've got a few peppers that I'm let do their thing inside a pot while the rest I've been pruning. Those seem to have much more foliage..