WHY ARE MY PEPPER PLANT FLOWERS FALLING OFF?
Have you been asking this question: Why Are My Pepper Plant Flowers Falling Off? I have got an answer for you. Pepper plants often sprout hundreds of flower buds. However, not all the flower buds get fertilized in the long run, some will be fertilized and become pepper pods, while others will drop from the plant. This article will show why your pepper plant flowers are falling off and what causes them beyond fertilization issues.
WHY ARE YOUR PEPPER PLANT FLOWERS FALLING OFF?
So, let’s start with the big question: Why Are Pepper Flowers Falling Off? There are many reasons why your pepper plant flower falls off. But before we look at the major causes, I would love to inform you that the majority of flower drops in your pepper plant are natural.
Normally, Pepper plants produce more flowers than needed. They often do this to attract more pollinators and ensure that a good number of their flowers are fertilized.
Extreme Temperature
The Pepper plant hates extreme temperatures and hotness. This causes drought for your pepper plant and makes the water available insufficient to serve the plant. Thus the pepper plant flower falls off and causes pepper leaves to die or turn yellow. This is especially common in cold weather, below 50°F.
Excess Nitrogen
Just as I have mentioned earlier, there are certain nutrients that pepper plants need to thrive and one such nutrient is Nitrogen. Nitrogen is a very important nutrient for a well-rounded pepper’s growth, performance, and productivity. Besides helping your pepper plant grow big, an excess presence of Nitrogen in your soil makes your pepper plant unhealthy and causes it to produce more leaves than flowers or buds.
When nitrogen is excessive for your pepper plant, the plant notifies you in different ways and one of such ways is by your pepper plant flower falling off. Thus, makes you ask the question: Why Are Pepper Flowers Falling Off?
Signs That Shows Excessive Nitrogen On Your Pepper Leaves
At this stage, let me outline some of the signs you will notice once your pepper plant flower starts falling off as a result of excessive nitrogen. In no particular order, here are a few of them:
- Pepper flowers start falling off
- Pepper leaves start turning yellow
- Pepper leaves start falling off
- Pepper plant starts experiencing stunted growth.
How To Stop Your Pepper plant flower From falling off By reducing Nitrogen
To stop your pepper plant flower from dropping off is very simple. All you need to do is reduce the application of nitrogen filled fertilizers. While a lot of fertilizers contain nitrogen, there are organic compost that contains minimal dose of nitrogen which you can use too.
Over-watering.
Pepper plant dislikes too much water. They would prefer to be moderately watered than be swamped with water. As a gardener or farmer, you should know that over-watering is not good for your pepper plant. Too much or excess water in the soil is a big threat to your pepper plant’s health. Besides causing your pepper plant flower to drop, it also causes the leaves to drop and also can lead to stunted growth and cause your pepper plant leaves to turn yellow.
Signs That Your Pepper Plant Suffers from Excessive Water
- Stunt growth in pepper plant
- Root rot in pepper plant
- Yellowness of pepper leaves
- Poor produce of pepper fruit
Do not dampen your farm with water. You just need enough water just enough to keep the soil moist. Once water is logged in your farm, your pepper root will become logged as well and it will cause it to rot.
How Do I Water My Pepper Plant?
When it comes to watering your pepper plant, the first step is to check if your pepper garden actually need water. You can do this by digging your index finger into the soil or beds and feeling the soil to determine how moist or not it is. This is the simplest way to determine soil moisture level without using any instrument and to avoid over watering.
However, there are instruments you can use that are cheap and pocket-friendly. For example, you can also use a water meter which is pocket-friendly to tell the amount of water in your soil.
If you are growing in plastics, containers, sacks, pots, or grow bags, the best way to check this is by lifting them and feeling how heavy they are. This can be difficult most times but if you do it often, you will soon be able to accurately determine the amount of water left and make a decision if you should add more.
Check out this post: 6 Best Ways to Water Your Cucumbers, Tomatoes & Watermelons
Phosphorus or potassium deficiency:
Lack of Phosphorus is one reason why your pepper plant flowers are falling off. Pepper plant requires enough phosphorus or potassium to produce flower and pepper pods, but when this nutrient is not available in the right quantity, pepper plants tend to struggle to produce pods. To solve this, I will recommend you use any fertilizers with a good dose of both Phosphorus and potassium to boost your soil and correct any potential deficiency.
Lack of Pollinators
Bees are one major pollinator of Pepper plants. When pollinators like bees and others are not present or can’t be found pollinating your pepper plant, it can easily lead to your pepper plant flowers falling off. Besides the lack or pollinators, incomplete pollination is another issue.
Incomplete pollination happens in your pepper plant when pollinator like bees does a poor job collecting pollen from the male pepper plant flowers and carrying them to female pepper plant flower. This happens as a result of extreme hotness, heat or very high temperature on your farm, or fewer pollinators.
Not just that, Bees are expected to collect hundreds of pollen grains to your pepper plant female flowers for a bountiful harvest to happen. This is because one pollen grain forms a single seed is not enough. So, if the bees collect and transfer only one pollen grain to your pepper plant female flower, this is already a sign of a poor harvest coming.
The thing is; the larger your farm or pepper plant the higher the number of pollinators needed to deliver a perfect pollination job. If you have over 300 pepper plants for example, and only two to ten bees are found on your farm or visit your pepper plant female flower, it means that your pepper will not be completely pollinated and its flowers will drop off.
How Do I Attract More Pollinators to My Garden or Farm?
There are a lot of ways you can fill up your farm or garden with pollinators. Here are a few of them:
- Avoid pesticides that are not pollinator-friendly.
- Plant nectar-rich flowers around or closer to your garden or farm. They attract bees.
- Plant crops like bee balm, anise hyssop, and coneflower.
- Throw in overripe banana or banana peels into your farm or garden area.
General Tips on Growing a Healthy Pepper Void of Flower Drop Off and Ensures Bountiful Harvest
Now that we have seen the reasons why your pepper plant flowers are falling off, here are some of our major recommendations for keeping peppers happy.
Nourish your Soil with nutrients:
Nourishing your soil before planting or even after you have planted your pepper is one way to ensure a bountiful harvest of pepper fruit and most importantly avoid your pepper plant flowers from dropping off. So, once you get land cleared for farming, know that you are expected to add compost, manure, or other organic material at intervals to ensure it remains healthy and fertile for your crop. This does not only keep the soil fertile, it goes further to ensure that the soil has good bacteria within it, and it also ensures healthy plants.
Water Moderately:
The pepper plant hates too much water. So, instead of watering excessively, moderate watering will always suffice. Do not water your pepper plant too much. Excessive watering of your pepper plant will always cause stuff like stunted growth, Yellowness of pepper leaves, flower dropping and many other issues to your pepper.
Harvest ripe pepper fruits.
I know your pepper looks all beautiful with ripe fruit on them. And I know you would always love to leave ripe pepper fruit on the pepper plant so you can continually savor the beauty. But dear farmer or gardener, you have to pick the ripe fruits. Picking your ripe pepper fruit is a great way to encourage the plants to continue producing until the season ends. So, don’t just sit and savor the beauty of a ripe pepper fruit, pick them up and give the pepper plant another chance to create more beauties.
Don’t Be Merciful on Pests.
Pests destroy pepper plants, do not be merciful to them. Make it a culture to spot and eliminate pests as soon as possible before they wreak havoc on pepper plants. By keeping a sharp eye out for pests, many farmers have been able to solve the problem of pests on their pepper plants without spending so much money on chemicals. While there are loads of pesticides and herbicides out there you can use, growing plants that attract beneficial insects to your garden is one pocket-friendly way to combat pests in your farm or garden.
Prune your Pepper Leaves:
There are 3 stages at which you can prune your pepper plant. The first one comes in the transplanting stage while the last comes During the Harvest stage. At the transplanting stage, this is perfect for you if you raise your pepper in a nursery before planting. This will help your pepper plants get used to their new environment in your garden faster. While at the Harvesting stage. This is another perfect time to prune your pepper plant. Beside growing big and strong, pruning peppers will always help them produce a much better harvest.
Here are detailed articles that will teach you how to do all the stuff I mentioned above
Check out these articles:
Final Thought:
I hope with this article; you have been able to discover the reasons why your pepper plant flowers are falling off. It is important to note that besides your pepper plant flowers falling off, other stuff like stunted growth, and yellowness of pepper leaves can greatly affect your pepper plant. Learning how to provide your soil with all it needs to give you a better result will help you achieve a better and bountiful harvest. And if you love to get more guidance, join our community of gardens and farmers from all over the world here: Brilliant Tech Farmers Hub.
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