Tree Stuff Blog

Learning to Grow Chillies, by Ben Gaia www.dialatree.co.nz


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No point starting Chillies off in winter as they need the real spring warmth. Then you will need to keep birds and slugs off or they will all disappear like mine and you will need to re-sow a whole lot of seed.

As soon as they hint at flowering your chilli plants should be potted into quite a large bucket with a big saucer. They like a big root space, or being in the ground. They are generally healthy except when planted in previous tomato soil which can give them a blight. They like warmth and hate frost. If you manage to over-winter them the first year, this will give you a big bush that will then produce lots the second year or longer. As they fruit, keep the water up and occasionally pick young fruit, or trim the flowers to stimulate more fruit. They like rich food and extra potassium from wood ash.

In Westland a tunnel house is essential to get the temperatures needed for a long chilli growing season. They LOVE 20 degrees C in the day, with a cooler night. Low night temperatures can stimulate flowers, being an andean plant. Growing under cover extends their growing period and keeps off the winter cold and frost. Plenty of sun light should reach the plants.

Winter

As winter hits I am discovering Chillies' worst enemies are wind and snails, rather than cold itself. Cold damp weather, and frost, brings on a furry grey mould which can spread quickly to the whole plant. If all your plants have this, time to pull them out and re-sow seed in spring. A cold draught and the poor things will curl over their leaves like pleading hands - "No! No!" - and they will wither and shrivel. So side protection in your tunnel house or sunny area is important.
Worst of all my best young fruiting bushes all suddenly stopped producing! Was it winter? Well - it was a new generation of cool-weather snails with a taste for the young flowers and fruit, (possibly Mexican snails!). They were nipping them all in the bud overnight and dashing off and hiding away off in the bushes by day. Back to snail patrols by torchlight, and bingo, tiny cayennes and habaneros have reappeared, even now in June.


Late summer and the Cayenne chillies have started fruiting



Edible, not Deadly

Despite the fashion for growing horrible macho chillies that blow away all sense of taste or even all good sense, like the famous Carolina Reaper, I prefer to grow Chillies for the flavour. We all love a bit of heat but anything hotter than a Habanero is too hot for comfort. Guys, we don't need to prove anything. Just travel in Asia, where the wickedest chillies I have ever found were in Singapore, and not to be trifled with by foolish tourists! The "My fifteen long minutes from hell in Changi", South Malay peppers, nonchalantly tempting on a cafe table to trap the macho Kiwi traveller. Oh dear!

The big learning curve this year has been in variety selection. It seems the familiar is best with the small green/red dangly cayenne chillies fruiting earliest and producing quite prolifically, with early season flavour and later on some good heat. Perhaps taking gold medal for best grower in the NZ climate is an Indian variety: Bangalore Whippets, long green (then red) curly things that are full of fruity. apple flavour. Also the sturdy big Jalapeño bush, a good producer, not so hot when green, gaining heat into late summer. The hottest varieties are Carribean. The Cuban Habanero is great fun, small peppers that flower profusely and are simply delicious, very hot little morsels of pinkness. I was surprised these did so well in my frigid South Island climate, as the other tropical varieties have struggled to even reach flowering stage. These are truly hot and I would be content to make a large curry from one tiny pepper. And despite raising a few plants of "Thai Hot," and "Birds Eye", very spicy little upward-growing chillies...well, dreams are free, but it is possible that our climate just doesn't encourage them to fruit. Which won't stop me trying next year. I will also attempt to add Gunter (Hot Indian), Asian Fire (Hot Vietnamese), and Serrano (Tasty Mexican) to my Chilli farm. No harm in trying. And there are so many types of seeds to choose from. We have nothing to lose but our taste buds.

The overall winner for me this year has been the "Indian Hot Jwala", a big green chilli. Despite only raising two plants, and three peppers, the flavour and heat were awesomely delicious and made me glad to be alive, which is what Chilli growing is all about!

Cayenne Chillies ripening on a sheltered deck, Autumn.



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