If you like a pepper that is hot, sweet and spicy, then the Hungarian wax pepper may be the right pepper for you to plant. Like their name suggests, Hungarian wax peppers were developed in Hungary. This pepper is a good choice for people who are sensitive to eating hot peppers like haberno. This pepper is not overly hot, but it gives your food a little kick. When the Hungarian wax pepper, also known as a hot banana pepper sets on the plant, they are a pastel yellow color. The color changes to red the longer they are left to grow on the plant. This changes their flavor, and makes them a little sweeter. The fruits are about 6 inches long and 1.5 inches wide. The plant bears fruit 70 days after transplanting.
If you don’t have the garden space, or if you want some pepper plants close to the door of your house, Hungarian wax peppers will do quite well. This article will tell you how to grow your hot banana peppers in a container.
Find a Container
When choosing a container, find one that is at least 16 inches in diameter. The container can be made of plastic, wood, terra-cotta or ceramic. We’ve even used a hot water heater cut in half, length wise, to grow ours. Just make sure there are drainage holes in the bottom to provide adequate drainage.
Fill with Potting Soil
Cover the drainage holes with rocks or pieces of shard. If you have some unused screen, you can use that to cover them. Fill the container with potting soil, stopping when the soil level is a half-inch below the rim. You can use potting soil already prepared, or you can mix your own. A simple homemade potting soil is made by combining equal amounts of composted soil, peat moss and perlite.
Transplant the Peppers
Dig your holes making them the same size as the Hungarian wax pepper’s root ball. The number of plants you can put into the container depends on size the size of the container. A half wine barrel can hold two to three pepper plants. Space them evenly apart.
Carefully remove the pepper plants from their containers. Pepper plants are sold as single plants in pots, or in plastic packs that contain 4 to 6 plants. To remove the peppers from cell packs, gently squeeze the bottom of a cell. This will dislodge and pop the root ball up and out. Sometimes the packs are open cells. If your peppers are growing in this container, cut between the plants with a knife. If you grew your own pepper plants, and used peat pots, remove the top inch of the pot away. If you plant the peat pot without doing this, the exposed peat pot will act as a wick, robbing the pepper plant of water.
Place the root ball into the planting hole. Make sure that the root ball is level with the surrounding soil. Pepper plants cannot be buried any deeper than they were originally growing, or the stem will rot. Firm the soil around the root ball with your fingers.
Water and Fertilize the Plants
Thoroughly water the soil in the container. Check the soil for moisture daily. Containers dry out quicker than the soil on the ground.
When the plants begin to flower, feed the Hungarian wax pepper plants with a time-released fertilizer. Mix and apply according to label directions.
Check for Bugs
Keep an eye out for destructive bugs. Two pests that love to eat your pepper plants are aphids and white flies. When these bugs make an appearance, you need to eradicate them. Find an insecticidal soap safe to use on vegetable plants. If you don’t want to use a chemical insecticidal soap, you can make your own. Combine 1 gallon of water with 2 tablespoons of liquid dish soap. Pour this into a sprayer. Never use the insecticidal soap if the sun is shining on the leaves, because it can burn them. Four or five days later, spray the pepper plants again with the insecticidal spray. If this does not take care of the bugs at the end of another 5 days, spray them again.
Source:
“From Container to Kitchen”; D. J. Herda; 2010