A native of Central America, sweet pepper, like tomatoes with eggplant, belongs to the family of nightshade crops, and in weather conditions Russia does not grow under natural conditions. Therefore, it is propagated by seedlings, and only in summer planted in open ground, preferably in a greenhouse. Breeders created varieties of sweet pepper, unpretentious to temperature extremes and resistant to its decrease, the most diverse color of fruits, from yellow to dark red and even purple.
The shape is also diverse: small and round, large cone-shaped, pyramidal, similar to tomatoes, and others. Resistant to cool temperatures, resistant to disease, not requiring difficult to manufacture shelters, pepper gives excellent crops even in Siberia.
Growing sweet pepper
Seedlings are planted in February or in the first week of March. Regardless of the sweet pepper variety , the seeds germinate for a rather long time, from 15 to 20 days. In order to accelerate germination, aloe juice is used, diluting it with water 1: 1, soaking seeds in it for a day or two. Seedlings do not dive (do not transplant with a clipping of the central root, like tomatoes).
Seedlings are planted in open ground when the soil warms up and the temperature is at least 25 or 20 degrees (14 ... 17 at night). In the south, where it is higher, they need to be regularly watered, otherwise the plants drop their ovary and flowers.
The heat of 40 degrees and above leads to the fact that the roots can die out and the plants wilted. All varieties of sweet pepper prefer sunny areas with good soil, fertile and rich in nitrogen. In the shade, they stretch out, the ovary is poorly formed and the fruits ripen.
Usual care: weeding, watering and loosening, feeding on time (during watering). The best feeding is bird droppings, which must be diluted with water quite strongly: no more than a glass of droppings per bucket of water. It is good to introduce humus into the soil before planting.
Sweet pepper varieties: early ripe
Claudio F1 (72-85 days), Seville (95 days), Orange Miracle (100-110 days), Montero, Ilya Muromets (125 days), Ivanhoe (105-110 days).
Varieties of sweet pepper with medium ripening
All varieties cannot be indicated, here are some of them. California miracle - 130 days ripening, this variety does not like too many fertilizers with nitrogen, the bush turns out higher, and fewer fruits. The yellow bull is a virus-resistant variety, the fruits are very large, juicy and fleshy, yields a yield of up to 7 kg per m2. The Red Bull variety has the same characteristics.
Drought-resistant plants: Veronica, Anastasia, Lyudmila, Bogdan and the Red Giant. Crop varieties: Giant Orange, Kolobok, Bogatyr, Topboy and Topgerl, Atlant and Antey.
Varieties of sweet pepper for the Urals
Early ripe: Barguzin, Bulgarian, Pinocchio F1, Dobrynya Nikitich, Single F1, Magician, Latino, Kubyshka. Montero, Sonata F11.3, Seville.
Mid-season: Aries F1, Alyosha Popovich, Agapovsky, Freckle, Dawn, Player, Knight, Sonata F1 and others.
Varieties of sweet pepper for Moscow region
A very good variety is the Gold Medal, which has a high yield, up to 10-19 fruits per bush, this is up to a kilogram of peppers. They also develop well and give a fairly stable crop of Aries and the Atlantic. Belozerka is an early variety, also high-yielding and characterized by the simultaneous ripening of a large number of fruits. Plants of medium ripeness - Bulgarian 79, fruits of red color, have a pyramidal shape.
Early ripening - Winnie the Pooh and Gogoshary (local). The first grade is a low plant, it produces cone-shaped fruits, sweet, with thick walls. Gogoshary is a folk variety. Medium-sized fruits, similar to tomatoes, weighing about 100 grams, dark green. From early maturities Cardinal F1, Denis F1, Indalo F1, Health, Kerala F1, and Single F1 are also popular. From mid-season varieties - Yolo-miracle, Novo-Gogoshary, California miracle, Victoria.