Grow 3X More Bell Peppers (Stop This Mistake)!

Last year, I got six peppers from four pepper plants. Just six peppers. This year, from those same four plants in the same garden, I harvested 42 peppers. What changed? I stopped making five simple mistakes. And right now, your pepper plants are probably making these same mistakes. You look at your plants and they seem healthy. Big green leaves everywhere. Strong, thick stems. But when it's time to harvest, you barely get any peppers. Or the flowers fall off before turning into fruit. Today, I'm showing you the five mistakes that stop peppers from producing and how to fix every single one. Number four involves adding one ingredient to your soil that costs 30 cents and made my plants explode with peppers in two weeks. And at the end, I'll show you a hand technique that stops flowers from dropping. Before we start, drop a comment right now telling me what country you're watching from. I want to see every single location in this community. And if you want way more peppers this year, hit that subscribe button and turn on notifications. Let's get into it. Mistake number one is using the wrong fertilizer. Most people don't know this, but there's fertilizer for leaves and fertilizer for fruit. If you use leaf fertilizer when your plant should be making peppers, you'll get a giant leafy plant with almost no peppers. Fertilizer has three numbers on the bag. Something like 10-5-5 or 5-10-10. That first number is nitrogen. Nitrogen makes leaves grow. When you first plant young pepper seedlings, a little nitrogen is good. It helps them grow strong. But once your pepper plant starts making flowers, you need to stop giving it high nitrogen fertilizer. If you keep using it, the plant thinks you want more leaves. So it makes more leaves instead of peppers. The flowers fall off. The fix is easy. As soon as you see the first tiny flower buds on your plant, switch to a different fertilizer. Look for numbers like 5-10-10. That's low nitrogen in the front, higher numbers in the middle and back. Those help make flowers and fruit. Use this fertilizer every 2-4 weeks at half the strength it says on the package. Also, stop adding fresh manure or blood meal once your plants start flowering. Fresh manure has way too much nitrogen. Use old compost instead that's been sitting for a year or more. What happens if you don't switch fertilizers? You'll have the biggest, greenest pepper plant on the block. But when August comes, you'll only get a handful of peppers when you were expecting dozens. Type nitrogen if you think this might be your problem. Mistake number 2 is not enough sunlight. Pepper plants need 6-8 hours of direct sun every single day. Not sun filtered through tree branches or blocked by a fence. Direct sun shining on the plant with nothing in the way. When peppers don't get enough sun, they stretch upward trying to find light. The plant uses all its energy growing taller and making more leaves. Making flowers and peppers takes a back seat. You can tell this is happening when you see long skinny stems with big spaces between the leaves. The plant grows tall but doesn't branch out much. And you won't see many flower buds forming. The best fix is to move your peppers to a sunnier spot next year. If you're already in the middle of the season and can't move them, try this trick. Take aluminum foil and lay it on the ground around the base of your plant. The foil reflects sunlight back up onto the lower leaves. If you're growing peppers inside your house or in a greenhouse, you can buy grow lights. Hang them 12-18 inches above your plants. Keep them on for 12-14 hours each day. A common mistake is thinking that bright shade is good enough for peppers. It's not. Another mistake is planting peppers right next to taller plants, like tomatoes. Those tall plants block the sun and your peppers will lose. Type sunlight if your peppers are in a shady spot. If you're learning things you didn't know before, hit that subscribe button right now. Mistake number three is temperature problems. Peppers love heat, but only up to a point. The best temperature during the day is between 70 and 85 degrees. At night, between 60 and 70 degrees. When temperatures go outside this range, the plant stops producing. If it gets too hot during the day, up in the high 80s or 90s, the pollen inside the flower dies. The flower looks fine, but can't make a pepper because the pollen isn't working. The flower falls off and you get nothing. Here's how to help your plants when it's too hot. Get shade cloth from any garden store. Look for 30 to 50 percent shade cloth. Hang it over your plants during the hottest part of the day, from about 11 in the morning until 4 in the afternoon. Also put mulch around your plants, straw, or chopped up leaves. Put a layer two to three inches thick on the ground around each plant. This keeps the soil cooler and helps it hold water. Water your plants in the morning, not in the middle of the day. Morning watering lets the roots soak up water before it gets hot. When nights get too cold, below 55 degrees, the pepper plant won't make peppers. It just waits for warmer weather. For cold nights, cover your plants in the late afternoon with a sheet or plant cover. Take the cover off in the morning. If nights stay too warm, above 75 degrees, the plant can't cool down and recover from the hot day. Make sure air can move around your plants. Don't crowd them together. If you live in zones 9, 10, or 11, plant your peppers in fall and winter to avoid brutal summer heat. In zones 3, 4, 5, or 6, plant in late spring after nights stay above 60 degrees. In zones 7 or 8, plant from spring through fall, but use shade cloth during hot summer months. Type temperature if weather has been stopping your peppers. Mistake number 4 is the 30 cent fix I promised. This is about calcium and watering. Peppers need calcium to build strong fruit. Without enough calcium, you get blossom and rot. That's when the bottom of the pepper turns black and rotten while growing. Once this happens, that pepper is ruined. Here's the surprising part. Your soil probably already has plenty of calcium. The real problem is that your plant can't get to it because of how you're watering. Calcium travels through the plant along with water. If your soil goes from completely dry to soaking wet, then back to dry again, the calcium can't move properly. The developing peppers never get the calcium they need. The fix starts with watering the right way. Give your plants 1 to 2 inches of water each week. Water deeply so it soaks down into the soil. Let the top inch or two of soil dry out between waterings. To check if you need to water, stick your finger into the soil near the plant. If it feels damp an inch or two down, don't water yet. If it feels dry that deep, it's time to water. If you've tested your soil and it truly doesn't have enough calcium, you can add gypsum. It costs about 30 cents worth for each plant. Mix it into the soil. You can also save your eggshells from breakfast. Crush them into tiny pieces and mix them into the soil. The most common mistake is thinking blossom-end rot always means you need to add calcium. Most of the time, the problem is actually how you're watering. Fix your watering schedule first before adding things to your soil. Type calcium if you've seen that black rotten spot on your peppers. Mistake number 5 is poor pollination. This is the bonus technique I promised. Bell peppers can pollinate themselves. Each flower has all the parts it needs. But just because a flower can pollinate itself doesn't mean it always happens. When pollination doesn't work right, flowers fall off before making peppers. Or you get tiny deformed peppers that never grow to full size. If you're growing peppers inside or in a greenhouse, there's no wind and no bees to move the pollen around. Very hot weather can damage pollen. Heavy rain or humid air can make pollen clump together. The good news is you can help pollination happen yourself. This is called hand pollination. Every morning when the flowers are open, gently shake each plant or tap the flowers with your finger. This tiny bit of movement releases the pollen and lets it land where it needs to go. You can also use a small soft paintbrush or a cotton swab. Gently brush the inside of each flower or use a clean electric toothbrush. Turn it on and touch it to the stem near the flowers. The vibration works just like a bee landing. Do this every day or every other day while your plants are flowering. Make it part of your morning routine and you'll see way more flowers turning into peppers instead of falling off. Plant flowers near your peppers that bees love. Marigolds work great. So do basil, zinnias, and sunflowers. When bees visit these flowers, they'll also visit your pepper flowers. And don't spray pesticides while your peppers are flowering. The spray will kill or scare away the good bugs that help with pollination. If you have a pest problem, pick the bugs off by hand or use soapy water spray. Let me recap. Five mistakes fixed means three times more peppers. Mistake 1. Using high nitrogen fertilizer after flowering starts. Switch to low nitrogen. Mistake 2. Not enough direct sunlight. Move to a sunnier spot or use reflective foil. Mistake 3. Temperatures too hot or too cold. Use shade cloth for heat and covers for cold. Mistake 4. Inconsistent watering blocking calcium. Water regularly and deeply. Mistake 5. Poor pollination. Help it along by hand every morning. I went from six peppers to 42 peppers by fixing these five mistakes. Same garden. Same plants. Seven times more harvest. Which mistake are you making? Leave a comment and tell me. Is it fertilizer? Sunlight? Temperature? Watering? Pollination? If you're ready to stop being just a consumer and start becoming a producer, hit that subscribe button and join our community. Let's grow our way to self-sufficiency together. If you enjoyed these pepper tips, you're going to love what's coming next. In the next video, I'm showing you the infinite basil trick. It's the only plant in your kitchen that views a harvest as a signal to grow faster. So hit subscribe now so you won't miss out. Thanks for watching and see you in the next one.