Grow Your Own Magazine

My chilli plants are flowering but the flower stems have gone yellow as the flower has died off and I am worried that the flower head will wither ,drop off and no fruit will develop behind it??

Has anyone ever noticed what colour the flower stem goes before the fruit appears?

Mine usually stay green. I have had some flowers drop off this year though and the stems go yellow first. I think it might be to do with the temperatures, there don't seem to be the insects around at the moment to do the business and pollinate things. You could try pollinating any open flowers very gently with a soft artists brush and see if the next lot form fruit.

Don't panic too much - they keep fruiting for a good long period. have fun!

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Happy Gardening,
Shirley

http://www.honeyjukes.co.uk

I did try with my finger but I must admit its the most delicate of fingers....

Are they not self fertile then?

I had noticed this was happening to my apache chillies too. I thought it might be no sun and generally just rubbish weather even though mines are on a sunny (or not) windowsill....

Mines tend to drop off before they flower but the flowers that have opened ok don't seem to have any fruit behind them... I have never grown anything before though so haven't a clue what should be happening!

C

I have no idea at all about whether they are self-fertile. I only started growing them last year. I have one plant which lost the first 3 flowers the same way yours sound. Then the weather improved for a while and it got some fruits - I also noticed more insects in the greenhouse. Could be either one that made the difference but couldn't say for sure.

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Happy Gardening,
Shirley

http://www.honeyjukes.co.uk

They are normally self fertile, so pollinarion shouldn't be too much of a problem. I have had lots of flowers drop off in the last month, i'm sure its down to the temperature. Chillies will only set fruits within a certain range of temperatures - between 15 and 34 degrees centigrade.

What with the odd weather we've been having, i'm not suprised - it's blumming chilly out there some days!

However - all is not lost, they will continue to flower and fruit all sumer, so there's plenty of time to get some fruits growing. Make sure they're not in a draught or in a sizzling sunny position (although sun is good), just somewhere warm and protected is good.

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There's vegetable growing in the family, but I must be adopted
Happy Gardening!

We had the same problem with a Scotch Bonnet chilli plant, just kept dropping it's flowers. We read up, and realised that we weren't keeping the soil damp enough, thinking that chilli plants grow in hot places so wouldn't want to be that wet... After checking twice daily that the compost was damp enough and feeding with tomato food, the chillis started coming within days. The plant is outside now and even with the mouldy weather they're still fruiting, so temperature might not be the issue?!

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Sarah

“Tell me one last thing,” said Harry. “Is this real? Or has this been happening inside my head?”
“Of course it is happening inside your head, Harry, but why on earth should that mean that it is not real?”

I have about 100 chilli plants in my tunnel and they are all flowering away merrily, and some even have chillis starting to appear. I think that dependent on variety, the flower can dissapear and the chuilli will have started forming but you don't notice as it is so small. Some bush type cherry toms are like this too.

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Rat

British by birth
Scottish by the Grace of God

Blog updated Wednesday November 13th

And broad beans as well..............................I hope!

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My Majesty made for him a garden anew in order
to present to him vegetables and all beautiful flowers.- Offerings of Thutmose III to Amon-Ra (1500 BCE)

My chillies and peppers and aubergines all did the plenty of flowers but just dropping off and no fruits trick. Now I have plenty of everything. Your fruits will be along - any day now.

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From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs.