Finally moving the peppers
I finally have some free time to move pepper plants out of old containers into new containers. After reading the label of Captain Jack’s Neem Max Concentrate I decided I would do the following.
- Pull out the root ball and brush out as much dirt and debris as possible
- Swirl the root ball in a bucket of water to dislodge stuck on dirt
- Dip the full plant in neem oil. Swirl root ball again in oil to make sure roots get fully coated.
- Plant in new potting soil mix
I was initially going to rinse of the oil in another bucket of water, but that seemed unnecessary on the instructions. The plants were not watered into the new potting mix. I will spray the soil down to remove air pockets in a few days. Along with filling any gaps when the soil settles.
Products
The following products were used:
Observations
While brushing away the dirt I saw no presence of bugs or pests. The roots didn’t look terribly warped. Nor were they malformed, wrapping over each other, or possessing weird tumors. There was no mush or rot on any of the plants.
The only thing I really noted: The roots of plants in container pots that had a 3” paper pot transplant seemed stunted compared to plants that were missing paper pots entirely. The bottom of the paper pot the roots did fine working their way through the thin newsprint. The double lined walls of the paper pot was where most of the stunted growth resided. Making for significantly less root growth in an outward direction. Alongside of that, a lot of these plants seemed curved at the pass. As if the lack of horizontal root growth allowed for more leaning of the main vine.
I am considering not doing paper plants next year and stick with a 2” → 3” → 4/5” transplant process with plastic containers. Then again, if the paper is peeled away prior to transplanting then likely the root stunting would not be so notable. Just a mess to pull apart.
Roots from the pepper plants of the Company Community Garden had amazing growth in all directions regardless of the paper pot. It was just a pain to pull out the remnants of the paper pieces from the large root ball.
The newly transplanted peppers were placed back in the supply room currently at 60.8 degrees Fahrenheit at 61% relative humidity. I still find that humidity number to be high, but I’m unsure what to do for it.