Well as I said a few weeks ago it has been a bonkers year for growing chillies in the new year. As you can see below those last few pods have ripened and despite it being the middle of December I am still picking ripe Scotch Bonnets.
Above is the last bonnet of the year, taken off a plant that has been under glass all summer. I finally harvested all of the remaining chillies yesterday and am now turning my thoughts to next year.
This year I didn’t start planting my seeds until late February so this year I intend to start at least a couple of months earlier. As well as sowing some seeds over the Christmas holidays I’ll be attempting to over winter half a dozen or so plants.
Below is a shot of the Scotch Bonnet I over wintered from last year. As you can see the growth it put on this year wasn’t excessive. Despite this it has produced a large yield of nice, hot scotch bonnets. I think one of the reasons for the limited growth was that I didn’t re-pot it when I prepared it last winter. As a result there can’t have been many nutrients in the potting medium this year, plus I didn’t exactly over feed it. I’ll try and over winter this bonnet again this year and treat it to plenty of good fresh potting medium.
As you can see below despite it being a few days short of mid December I’ve just harvested quite a large number of cayennes. In fact most of the pods below have come from pants I’ve neglected recently and have been outside in the recent frosts! I don’t think I’ve got quite enough to make a chilli ristra out of these so they’ll either end up in a Christmas wreath or in some of our famous chilli chutney.
