The practice of growing plants in pots and containers is known as container gardening. Container gardening is mostly practiced in urban homes, multistorey buildings of towns and cities and in places where availability of land is a major constraint. Jalapeno peppers are a favorite container-grown plant among urban population and this plant can be grown in containers successfully.
Some of the major considerations while preparing for raising a container garden of jalapeno plants are:
- Choosing right containers
- Choosing a good growing media
- Preparing a gardening schedule or a garden calendar
- Arranging all necessary gardening tools
Selection of Suitable Containers/Pots: Earthenware pots are most commonly used containers for growing jalapeno plants. Wooden barrels and planters can also be used and these containers should be painted from inside as well as outside with waterproof oil-paints before using them. Plastic jars, pots, dishes and bowls, glazed clay and china (porcelain) pots, shallow bowls and troughs, pottery containers, boxes and crates, cement pots, cans and buckets, tin boxes, drums, brass and copper containers may also be used according to the circumstances and growing requirements.
While it comes to the shape of the containers, any shape of the container can be used whether it is circular, round, oval, elliptical, cone, pyramid, rectangular, square, or heart-shaped.
Containers should have at least one hole of an adequate size at the bottom as in earthen pots, to drain out excess water. Containers can easily be placed on the terrace, window sills, window boxes, balcony and verandah where sunlight is available for the plants. Containers can hold sufficient volume of growing media and should be lightweight and easy to handle. Containers should be durable and free of toxic substances and also should prevent root circling.
Selection of Suitable Growing Media or Soil and Fertilizers: Growing media may be prepared from a mixture of good soil, river sand, well-decomposed organic manure (compost or farmyard manure), nitrogenous fertilizers (urea or ammonium sulphate) and recommended insecticides and fungicides. Growing media should be able to hold seedlings firmly. Media should be free of insect-pests and diseases and should have good water-holding capacity. Growing media should also have excellent aeration and drainage.
How to prepare a suitable growing media?
Mix good soil, river-sand and well-rotten organic manure in equal quantities with the help of a khurpi or shovel. Make sure that the mixture is free from various soil-borne insects, termites, red ants and cut worms. Add a small quantity of recommended fungicide (organic pyrethrum-based fungicides may be used)to the mixture before filling it in the containers; this helps to prevent seedling rotting caused due to fungal infections. After raising a crop for one season, the container mixture should be removed and cleaned of roots and exposed to the sun for a few days. This growing media could then be reused after mixing one-third the quantity of organic manure and a small quantity of recommended fungicide.
Alternatively, growers can prepare their own compost or vermicompost by using kitchen wastes and use it as growing media for their container-grown plants.
Preparation of a Garden Calendar: If you are planning for container-growing of jalapeno plants, then you should prepare a gardening schedule beforehand. A garden calendar should clearly indicate the following parameters,
- Sowing Time: When to sow the seeds?
- Fertilizer Schedule: When to fertilize plants? How many times?
- Irrigation/Watering Schedule: How much irrigation is required? And when?
- Weeding and Aftercare: What are the weed control measures to be adopted?
- Harvesting Time: When can fruits be harvested?
Arranging Garden Tools: A container garden needs to have some garden tools such as shovels, garden knife, measuring sticks, strings, hand hoes, dusters, sprayers, watering cans, and hand cultivators.
How to Grow Jalapeno Plants in Containers?
After arranging containers, growing media and necessary garden tools, a grower can start raising seedlings of jalapeno plants. Jalapeno plants are propagated by seeds.
Favourable temperature for seeds germination is 15–30°C. Seedlings are raised in well-prepared nursery beds. Nursery beds are prepared in a well-shaded area and seeds are either broadcasted or sown in rows in nursery beds. Germination process is slow and it may take up to 12 weeks for the seeds to germinate. Regular light watering is necessary to keep the nursery bed moist always. Moist soil facilitates quick germination of the seeds and seedlings will become ready for transplanting when they reach up to 6-8 weeks old.
For growing in containers, transplanting of seedlings can be done at any time. While transplanting, a single healthy seedling may be transplanted in each container. Sometimes two or more seedlings may be transplanted if necessary. Remember that plants in pots and containers need a lot of care and attention. So it is essential to water frequently depending on the season, kind of crop and size of the plant and container. Plants need extra water in dry summer season, so watering should be done twice a day (morning and evening). Too much watering can be as harmful in winter as too little in summer. In the rainy season, proper water drainage is essential if plants are placed in the open areas. If there is heavy rain, containers should be tilted slightly to drain out the excess water from the top.
Topdressing with nitrogenous fertilizers improves plant growth and yield. This can be done by foliar application of liquid nitrogen, urea or ammonium sulphate in small quantities. Alternatively, urea granules@ 5–10g/container may be applied in moist soil once a week or 10 days, starting from 2 weeks after transplanting seedlings. High dose of fertilizer is very harmful since it can kill the plants.
If urea or ammonium sulphate is applied in dry soil, the plants must be watered immediately. Young plants may require staking. Hand-hoeing and weeding with the help of a small khurpi should be done periodically to remove weeds. Weeds should also be uprooted gently by hand.
For container-grown plants, water requirement may be determined by weighing pots, feeling growing medium and by using indicator plants that readily show water stress. Watering should be done in early morning to minimize evaporation loss. Applying water in two or more applications conserves water.
Major insects found in container-grown plants are, aphids and jassids, and fruit flies and fruit borers. Aphids and jassids are small-sucking insects, injuring the plants especially in early stage of their growth. Fruit flies and fruit borers damage young fruits and make them unfit for consumption. Use of organic insecticides such pyrethrum-based sprays or tobacco emulsions, or neem oil based solutions effectively controls these insects. Use of mechanical traps (colour traps, light traps etc) and manual picking of insects may also be tried for insect control. After spraying with insecticides, vegetables should not be harvested for 7 days for consumption. Fungal diseases (damping off and wilt) and viral diseases affect the plants particularly in the rainy season. Fungal diseases can be controlled by drenching the soil with an appropriate fungicide. Virus affected plants should be removed and destroyed.
Flowering begins approximately after 8 weeks of transplanting. It takes about three to four months for the transplanted seedlings to grow into full maturity and produce ripe fruits. That is, within a span of 90-120 days, a grower can harvest his/her jalapeno pepper crop.
Pruning is essential to remove root circling when root systems become too long for their containers. Root circling can be prevented by air root pruning; by using bottomless containers and by using copper compounds. Pruning may be necessary to induce new growth and to remove undesirable growth and damaged or dead stems.
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