How to Grow Peppers Well? These Planting Tips You Need to Master
Choosing a Variety
? Before planting peppers, decide what variety you want to grow. Bell peppers, sweet peppers, ox-horn peppers, sheep-horn peppers, line peppers, pickling peppers, facing-heaven peppers (chili peppers), etc. You can choose based on the market and your planting experience.
Seed disinfection: Seeds without coating must be disinfected before sprouting, otherwise they are prone to infection by pathogens and viruses.
Treatment method: 50% carbendazim at 500 times, 70% thiophanate-methyl at 800 times, 8% Nonglinfeng No. 2 at 2000 times, 0.5% amino-oligosaccharin at 1500 times, or soak in hot water at 60-70°C for 20 minutes (stir while soaking to prevent scalding the seeds), generally soaking for about 30-60 minutes, then rinse and sprout.
?Cultivating Strong Seedlings
? As the saying goes: strong seedlings give thirty percent of the harvest. Cultivating strong seedlings is the key to high yield.
The standards for strong seedlings are: thick stems, dark green leaves, well-developed root systems, and no pests or diseases.
The seedling age is generally about 30-40 days. At the 3-5 leaf stage, they survive easily and recover quickly; beyond 7 leaves, the seedlings are too old, recover slowly, and growth is affected. Peppers generally begin flower bud differentiation at the three-leaf stage, so cultivating strong seedlings is the key to high pepper yields.
Fertilizer and Water Management
Peppers are shallow-rooted crops with poorly developed root systems, and they fear both drought and waterlogging, so special attention must be paid to fertilizer and water management.
Formula fertilization Producing 1000 kg of fresh peppers requires the absorption of about 5 kg of nitrogen, 1 kg of phosphorus pentoxide, and 6 kg of potassium oxide.
Fertilization plan Based on the nutrient uptake patterns and fertilizer requirements of peppers, with the goals of saving labor, saving effort, achieving high yield and high efficiency, and with the objectives of disease prevention, resistance to continuous cropping, soil improvement, and cost savings, the following fertilization plan is arranged:
1. Base fertilizer: Use 50-200 kg per mu of enzyme microbial agent at 200 million per gram (replacing chicken manure, pig manure, and various bio-organic fertilizers), plus 40-50 kg of 15-15-15 balanced compound fertilizer. Either cultivation furrows or cultivation holes can be used; ridge mulching cultivation is best, giving high yield and easy management.
2. After the first batch of flowers sets fruit, apply every 15 days or so along with watering: 4 kg of 20-10-20 water-soluble fertilizer + 3-5 kg of ordinary mineral potassium humate.
3. In the middle and late stages, apply every 15 days: 5 kg of 20-10-30 flush fertilizer + 300-400 g of premium mineral potassium fulvate.
4. After seedling recovery, spray "plant vaccine" foliar spray once every 10-15 days to prevent disease, prevent pests, regulate growth, increase yield and improve quality. Used as directed, the plants are basically free from pest and disease damage.
Water management When peppers suffer drought, flowers and fruits drop; when waterlogged, roots rot and plants die, also causing flower and fruit drop, so peppers fear both drought and waterlogging. Therefore, water frequently with small amounts, preferably by seepage irrigation or drip irrigation.
Cultivation management Pepper root systems are poorly developed. To make the root system well-developed and resistant to drought and waterlogging, change the previous cultivation method from below-ridge cultivation to on-ridge cultivation, which can increase yield by more than 20%. On-ridge cultivation combined with drip irrigation is even better.
????Pest and Disease Control
The main pests and diseases of peppers are anthracnose, phytophthora blight, viral disease, soft rot, root rot, bacterial wilt, stem base rot, fusarium wilt, root-knot nematode, as well as some whiteflies, greenhouse whiteflies, beet armyworms, cabbage caterpillars, etc.
Anthracnose Onset conditions: high temperature and high humidity, dense field canopy, and sunscald easily cause anthracnose. Anthracnose easily causes fruit rot and dry leaves, with concentric rings and blackening on leaves, causing declines in pepper yield and quality.
Control methods: (1) Increase application of organic fertilizer and bio-organic fertilizer to boost crop resistance. (2) Chemical control: anthracnose Fumei, Shigao, mancozeb, flusilazole prochloraz, Nonglinfeng No. 2, etc.
Precautions: Focus on prevention, minimize the spread of pathogens, and reduce the probability of disease occurrence. Temperature and humidity must be well controlled; excessive humidity and high temperature easily lead to disease, not just anthracnose. If temperature and humidity are well controlled, disease will basically not occur. This is also true for crops such as tomatoes and cucumbers; high temperature and high humidity favor the reproduction and spread of pathogens.
Phytophthora blight Most cases are due to residual soil or residual plant debris from peppers. Soil residues are the most common; under normal circumstances, 80% of pathogens and viruses exist in the soil, especially in sealed greenhouses or conservatories, so soil treatment is very critical.
Onset conditions: Pathogens overwinter in soil or plant debris. Humidity above 85%, temperature 10-32°C, with the optimum temperature 20-30°C.
Control methods: (1) Soil treatment. (2) Use ruiduotong, Nonglinfeng No. 2, yishuangling, etc. for control. (3) Apply more bio-organic fertilizer, chitin fertilizer, etc. to improve resistance.
Viral disease Pepper viral disease is a relatively stubborn disease with strong replication, rapid spread, and difficulty in control. There is currently no specific therapeutic agent, so prevention is the main approach.
Onset conditions: high temperature and drought, excessive plant growth, and high nitrogen levels.
Transmission routes: small brown planthoppers, whiteflies, aphids, etc.; soil transmission; human transmission.
Control methods: seed disinfection, attention to pest control, spraying pesticides, and improving resistance.
Precautions: If diseased plants appear, pull them out promptly. Try not to touch diseased plants with your hands to avoid spreading the virus.
Soft rot Soft rot is a major disease of peppers. It is a bacterial disease and mainly harms pepper fruits.
Occurrence characteristics: high temperature and high humidity, 25-30°C, and humidity above 85% cause severe occurrence; pathogens enter through wounds.
Transmission routes: rain transmission, irrigation water transmission, water splash transmission, and pest transmission.
Control methods: (1) Add bio-organic fertilizer to the soil to improve resistance. (2) Timely control boring pests such as tobacco budworms and cotton bollworms. (3) Use agricultural streptomycin, copper succinate, copper abietate, diyitong, Nonglinfeng No. 2, etc. for spray treatment, generally once every 5-7 days, spraying 2-3 times consecutively, and pay attention to rotating pesticides to avoid developing resistance.
Soil-borne diseases Root rot, bacterial wilt, fusarium wilt, stem base rot, and root-knot nematode disease all belong to soil-borne diseases. Once infected, whether by root drenching or spraying pesticides, the effect is poor.
Occurrence characteristics: severe damage, difficult to control, difficult to cure, high investment, and severe yield reduction.
Solutions: Only formula fertilization can be used. (1) Use bacteria to control bacteria. (2) Increase application of mineral organic fertilizer. (3) Avoid applying incompletely decomposed chicken manure. (4) Comprehensive soil remediation agents have better effects.
Blossom-end rot Blossom-end rot is a non-infectious disease caused by calcium deficiency. High summer temperatures easily cause calcium deficiency, leading to blossom-end rot. At this time, some farmers do not know what is going on and supplement calcium every day, yet still cannot control blossom-end rot. First, because the methods of calcium supplementation are different; second, because the calcium supplement products are different.