Good evening everyone. Today I wanted to do an upside down update. Specifically one lone jalapeno pepper, which came from an upside down plant.
First of all, do you all remember this post?
You can take a look at that old post and compare it to what has happened through out the summer. Below are the update photos.
I had put this rectangular pot upside down, double stacked on the counter in my kitchen and I was sprouting jalapeno seeds to plant.
I waited until all of the holes that I had drilled each had a little baby jalapeno plant growing. Then I flipped the entire planter. I put it outside and the plants began to grow, downward toward the ground.
All of the plants were sprouted at the same time and many did not make it. I am guessing that they did not get enough sun, but the one that did move out to the side has tree like stems and it is very strong. But only one pepper grows.
The whole idea of planting things upside down is to have two pots worth of plants growing but only using the space of one pot.
Over the last seven months I have planted everything from cucumbers to tomatoes to spinach on the top side of this pot and nothing sprouted.
I thought maybe the birds were coming in and stealing the seeds so I put a mesh over the top and zip tied it in place so there's no way they could scoop the seeds out of the dirt.
Still nothing grew. So the main benefit of using one pot with plants coming out the bottom and out the top was wasted in this case. So, sadly, I only have photos from the bottom.
Only one Jalapeno?
Yes - that is the sad reality.
This little plant grew all summer and looks healthy but it never got long enough for me to tie it to the side so it could get some sun.
The others got plenty of sun and there is evidence that they had flowers blooming but, well maybe, the bees are not used to looking below the pot to find flowers.
I had tried to pollinate any flowers that I see and I do a lot of that, hundreds per day on my carnivorous plants.
Chili peppers...
There is another plant just above the jalapeno pot. This one is round. I planted chili peppers in it and a couple survived and grew, but I did not even get one pepper.
It looks very healthy and you can see evidence of flowers that had budded. But for some reason, the bees did not get to them, and they never brought forth any chili peppers.
Even though this plant was a complete failure on upside down horticulture, I did include it in this post because it is this plant is taking advantage of the main benefit.
As you can see, there's a beautiful kale plant growing out the top, which I'm very proud of.
I heard that kale is way better when it's fresh out of the garden rather than store-bought. I am hoping to find out for myself very soon.
I have another roots-up plant that I would like to update you on - but that will be a longer post, including Ginger and Turmeric harvesting. I will be posting all winter as things still grow here in the cold - 50s and 60s. Till next time!
Thanks for following and commenting on my posts. Your support is appreciated!
everything grows better fresh out of the garden. I find supermarket kale wilts faster and goes yellow faster. I wonder if it was more to do with the plants sharing the same soil in the pot? Maybe try again next year and pollinate the floweres - seems no real reason why it wouldn't have produced espec if at least ONE did?
Yes, I agree. Why would one grow, and no more.
I love seeing these kinds of honest garden experiments,,, I never actually thought about how bees might miss the flowers if they are hiding underneath the pot-that makes total sense. Even though the upside-down peppers were a bit of a struggle, getting that single jalapeno is still a fun victory,,, And the kale growing on top looks incredibly healthy. You're definitely going to love the taste of it fresh from the garden. Looking forward to your ginger and turmeric update
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