Looking after your Chilli plants in British Weather

Hows your home grown chilli season going this year? With the wonderful British weather I have decided to try a few different methods to this year to help my chili plants grow. Here are a few useful 'how to tips' to give you a good chance of a more successful cop this year. 


If you are lucky enough to have a greenhouse you will need to ensure it is ventilate and dampened down to ensure the perfect conditions for your plants. Keep the chilli plants uniformly moist and apply a liquid feed too. The heat trapped in the greenhouse will greatly be appreciated by your little chilli plants.

If you’re planning to grow your chilli plants outside. for the best results, always select a sheltered, sunny spot with a well-drained but moisture-retentive and reasonably fertile soil. Or like me a god sunny position in a south facing garden in large pots like I have done for these two Hungarian Black chilli plants. To give them a helping hand with the sudden cold weather again I have fashioned a couple of cloches to keep them warm and out of the wind.

Hungarian Black Chilli Plants

If you plan to put your chili plants direct into the ground, if you haven't yet, harden them off  before planting them outside by exposing them to the colder weather . Be ready to protect outdoor chillies with fleece or cloches in adverse weather conditions. 

You will find the chilli plants establish themselves more quickly if you cover your proposed planting site with cloches a few weeks beforehand to warm-up the ground. You chosen spot will again need to have plenty of exposure to the sun. Personally I have not had huge success in the ground with the poor British summers.

 For more growing tips check out my basic guide here 

Chilli Competitions

If you like Competitions follow @Janesgrapevine and if you like Chilli growing, eating and competitions then make sure you head to the facebook page of Greenhouse Sensation and 'Like' their page to win free chilli goodies

They are experts in the art of growing chilli plants and providing you with some great tools and gadgets to grow your own and help you along what ever your level of experience. Best of all recently with their new facebook group they are offering constant competitions for you to watch out for and win yourself some chilli goodies like one of their chilligrows as pictured below at the start of this years season in my back garden. I entered their first competition and they gace me a small bag of chili peppers at the west dean chili fiesta just for being a customer and entering!

Keep watch and don't miss out

Chilligrow Greenhouse Sensation

Home Grown 2011: The ChilliGrow from Greenhouse Sensation

Throughout building this blog site and interacting with other keen chilli growers, I came across the ChilliGrow sold by Greenhouse Sensation. I have heard endless good reviews of this product and wanted to try it out for myself to boost my grow your own chili crop. So I have decided to put the chilli grow to the test! The ChilliGrow is designed together with the chilefoundry and also south Deavon chilli farm so already it has the seal of approval from two great groups who know their chilli.

Feeder Mat

Watering chilli plants correctly is hard even when you know what you are doing. The ChilliGrow does this for you using a 7 Litre water reservoir.

The three 6 litre pots looked quite big to me but the website assures me that this is the idea size to encourage both root and fruit growth. A nice touch is that the try is also drip proof so you can grow inside if you are restricted for space or perhaps in your greenhouse if you have one too.

The pots each have holes at the base to put through feeder mats that dip into the reservoir below. These will ensure that your plan remains perfectly watered.

Chilli Nutrients

In the pack you will also receive so real easy instructions and also some chili plant some nutrients to last you one season.

To see how good the good the chilligrow is and what it could do for my crops I have selected three different chilli plants. A Hungarian Hot Wax, Jalapeno and a Krakatoa.

The Hungarian Hot Wax is store bought from B&Q, the Jalapeno is home grown and finally my Krakatoa chilli plant is in its third year and has produced bumper crops the previous two years. What will happen??? I will let you know. Below is a picture of all three plants at of June 2011.



ChilliGrow