Do I need to pollinate my Bell Peppers?

007. · Aug 20, 2010

I'm growing two sweet bell peppers in an Aerogarden, which is basically a shallow water culture. There are small things growing that I initially thought were buds of flowers, but look like they could grow into peppers.

Do I need to pollinate them somehow for them to produce peppers? I mean, there are seeds in peppers, so some kind of reproduction must take place. But how can that occur without any pollination?

I can't find any information anywhere that leads me to think I need to do anything, but I figure most people grow outdoors where there's bees and whatnot to do the dirty work.

grapeman · Aug 20, 2010

DocLeaf · Aug 20, 2010

Peppers (capsicum) are pollinated by insects... normally bees, wasps, and hover flies. As the white flowers open,, insects travel from one flower to another flower and aid pollination.

If this occurs on the same plant the seeds that grow inside the fruit (pepper) will be inbred/selfed/ the same. The seeds you collect will be the same variety of pepper you grew. If the pepper is grown with other varieties of pepper/chilli however, then hybridization may occur, as an insect flies from one plant to another.

In the absence of insects,, or for the purpose of breeding,, then a small artists paintbrush can be used to paint pollen from one flower to another. This is often usefully indoors or where there is a absence of natural pollinators.

Hope this helps

dubwise · Aug 24, 2010

DocLeaf said:
Peppers (capsicum) are pollinated by insects... normally bees, wasps, and hover flies. As the white flowers open,, insects travel from one flower to another flower and aid pollination.

If this occurs on the same plant the seeds that grow inside the fruit (pepper) will be inbred/selfed/ the same. The seeds you collect will be the same variety of pepper you grew. If the pepper is grown with other varieties of pepper/chilli however, then hybridization may occur, as an insect flies from one plant to another.

In the absence of insects,, or for the purpose of breeding,, then a small artists paintbrush can be used to paint pollen from one flower to another. This is often usefully indoors or where there is a absence of natural pollinators.

Hope this helps

Before I learned this, we had lots of pepper flowers falling down and no peppers forming. I started to use a little paint brush and brushed each flower and then we had tons and tons of peppers.

007. · Aug 24, 2010

Awesome. Thanks Dubwise and DocLeaf. I've got 6 flowers open right now, three to a plant. I'll go ahead and start pollinating them. The buds looked so pepper-like before they opened that I figured they would just keep growing into peppers, which confused the hell out of me.

Thanks again for your help!

FunkBomb · Aug 24, 2010

I haven't pollinated anything in my garden and I've got veggies out the ass. Thank you bugs and bees.

-Funk

DocLeaf · Aug 25, 2010

Placing brightly coloured flowers (like marigolds) besides your peppers you will help attract insects. Just make sure the flowers are pest free

DocLeaf · Aug 26, 2010

Nimble hover-flies and wasps,, are as useful (if not more so) to pepper growers in the garden than the heavier bees are

so are butterflies,, but they like to lay eggs on plants,, which later hatch into hungry caterpillars

..as entomologists however,, we kinda dig that,, just not on the ganja :canabis:

007. · Aug 27, 2010

Wow, there's not much of a window on them for getting pollinated, is there?

I've had about 4 flowers fall, one flower start turning into a pepper, and the rest haven't gone either way yet as far as I can see.

I'm using a piece of paper towel. I should probably just go buy a paint brush.

I upgraded the air pump and stone and now my reservoir is really churning. The plants are pretty stoked I think.

Trancerdancer · Aug 28, 2010

Uh guys... I think we have some bunk info going on this thread

Peppers are self pollinating, they need no insect pollinators. In each flower there are both male and female parts which will combine without any help to make peppers. Maybe a gentle breeze will help but no insects necessary.

Environmental conditions can often lower the number of peppers that set fruit. Temps over 90 degrees will often cause flower drop with no fruit developing.

DocLeaf · Aug 29, 2010

Trancerdancer said:
Uh guys... I think we have some bunk info going on this thread

Peppers are self pollinating, .

Please see : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-pollination

Hope this helps

DocLeaf · Aug 29, 2010

007. said:
I'm using a piece of paper towel. I should probably just go buy a paint brush.

I use a finger,, or open the glasshouse doors so insects can fly in

007. · Aug 29, 2010

Trancerdancer said:
Environmental conditions can often lower the number of peppers that set fruit. Temps over 90 degrees will often cause flower drop with no fruit developing.

I guess that's possibly what caused the flower drop. Although I run my peppers indoors, hydroponically, like a cannabis grow, and temps have not hit 90 for sure.

DocLeaf said:
I use a finger,, or open the glasshouse doors so insects can fly in

I've started using Q-Tips, which seem to be working. Unfortunately I can't leave the door open as I'm growing these in my living room and I don't think my roommates would approve of me leaving the screen door open.

DocLeaf · Aug 30, 2010

F-your room-mates,, tell them we are growing pepper plants man! lol If possible , place them outside the screen for a few hours,, insects will come and go,, and your peppers will be pollinated

Trancerdancer is on the ball regarding temps :yes:

However we find that with the larger peppers (and some smaller chillies) that some flowers wither away naturally,, since the plant normally selects only the healthiest (most prominent) flower sites to make fruits on. This is especially the case when the fruits grow large.

Hope this helps

007. · Aug 30, 2010

I'm finding that my pollinating is working out fine. I try and hit them every day. i've got several new peppers starting to grow behind the stamens, although they still look like just flowers at first glance. The one pepper is growing well. I'll toss up some pics tomorrow to show what I've been doing with these.

To be honest I don't know that tossing them outside would help. We live in a downtown highrise, and the bugs that get up our way aren't bees and butterflies but houseflies, mayflies, and moths. Greasy bugs, basically. I don't know how much help they'd be. But they're here anyway. I always find flies and gnats dead around my bulbs.

Besides, it's cold outside here in Canada. Don't know that they'd thrive to well out there. They seem to be loving the way things are going so far, I think I'll just rock the Q-tips a while longer.

Thanks for all the advice guys!

n1knightmare · Aug 30, 2010

Thanks for all the info in this thread. I might have a better crop this year because last year i barely got any bell peppers at all. Now i know why. Thanks again.

dubwise · Sep 1, 2010

Run 'em again. Most only take ~75 days to finish....at least the bananas, jalapenos and bells that we're growing are to take that long. There is a great article in Urban Garded Magazine (Aug-Sept 09) "Lets Get Breeding Baby" which explains the breeding process of peppers very well. If you get a chance, check out the artice. It was very helpful to me.

Vape it! · Sep 6, 2010

Firstly apologies for jacking this thread....

Does anyone know if using ,for example the pollen from a serrano pepper to pollinate a bhut jolokia would alter the shape of the bhut fruit that results?
I realise that the seeds will be hybrids, just trying to understand why my bhut fruits are oddly shaped.

Thanks :tiphat:

dubwise · Sep 7, 2010

Great question! I'd like to know that too!

DocLeaf · Sep 7, 2010

Vape it! said:
Firstly apologies for jacking this thread....

Does anyone know if using ,for example the pollen from a serrano pepper to pollinate a bhut jolokia would alter the shape of the bhut fruit that results?
I realise that the seeds will be hybrids, just trying to understand why my bhut fruits are oddly shaped.

Thanks

No. The fruits will be the shape the parent plants normally produce. The plants and fruits next season (from the hybrid seeds) will be different

We normally leave any crossed fruits to mature fully before extracting the seeds. The fritillary seed Veggie thread (on this forum) explains how to store pepper seeds for next season.

post #29 https://www.icmag.com/ic/showthread.php?t=135915&page=2

Hope this helps

Do I need to pollinate my Bell Peppers?

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