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harvesting rocoto/manzano harvest time in Australia

Aussie

Aussie

We are having a great season for rocoto/manzano peppers this year. It is mid-summer and we have been enjoying fresh ripe rocoto/manzano peppers almost constantly since mid-winter but we're now starting to get overwhelmed! I usually leave the pods on the plant until we need them but a recent heat wave is leading to over-ripening on the plant, hence this harvest. The freezer is full of processed and unprocessed pods. Looks like time to start drying! This haul represents a small fraction of what we will get this year, if things continue to go well. Each container in the pic holds pods from a different plant - some are later ripening than others. 
 
 
Very cool. I've heard monzano powder is really good but I had so few last year that I never dried any. 
 
Here is my biggest so far this winter in the grow room. I have a while still. :rolleyes:
 
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Aussie said:
We are having a great season for rocoto/manzano peppers this year. It is mid-summer and we have been enjoying fresh ripe rocoto/manzano peppers almost constantly since mid-winter but we're now starting to get overwhelmed! I usually leave the pods on the plant until we need them but a recent heat wave is leading to over-ripening on the plant, hence this harvest. The freezer is full of processed and unprocessed pods. Looks like time to start drying! This haul represents a small fraction of what we will get this year, if things continue to go well. Each container in the pic holds pods from a different plant - some are later ripening than others. 
 
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Which plant produced the best yield?
 
Thanks a lot for the comments.
 
 
Jeff H said:
Very cool. I've heard monzano powder is really good but I had so few last year that I never dried any. 
 
Here is my biggest so far this winter in the grow room. I have a while still. :rolleyes:
 
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Very healthy looking plant, Jeff!
 
harry said:
Which plant produced the best yield?
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Best yield is definitely the top left one, locato PI 387838 (from http://www.thechilliman.biz). Smallish pods but the plant is vigorous and sets fruit easily. One of the hottest but also a little bitter tasting. Packed with seeds and you need patience to cook with these.
The middle left is rocoto San Isidro (Semillas). Also hot, great flavour. 
The middle right is the brown rocoto (Semillas), which is another hot one with a good flavour. 
bottom left: red rocoto (Nicky's seeds UK: http://www.nickys-nursery.co.uk)
 
The origin of the others is lost. Should have taken more to avoid losing the labels, I guess. Some of these plants are over 3 years old now. I have grown plants from seed from several different sources and the ones that I have now are those that grow best in my back yard. 
 
The red peppers in the middle/bottom container are from the plant with the highest weight yield.
 
This is shaping up as a very good season all round. My superhots about to come online. Here are pics of a ripening yellow scorpion and yellow bhut.
 

 
 
harry said:
How many Locato PI 387838 plants did you grow out thechilliman.biz seed?
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Only grew one to maturity (I generally plant 3 or 4 seeds and keep the strongest plant). Peter (Semillas) calls PI 387838 the mini rocoto. I bought seed from Peter and grew this one out, too. The mini rocoto pods were as advertised on Peter's website, i.e. mini sized. The pods that I have from John's locato (thechilliman.biz) are a similar shape and colour  but about twice as long and again, as advertised on John's website. The plants from Peter's and John's seeds are completely different. They appear to be quite different strains. 
 
Aussie said:
Only grew one to maturity (I generally plant 3 or 4 seeds and keep the strongest plant). Peter (Semillas) calls PI 387838 the mini rocoto. I bought seed from Peter and grew this one out, too. The mini rocoto pods were as advertised on Peter's website, i.e. mini sized. The pods that I have from John's locato (thechilliman.biz) are a similar shape and colour  but about twice as long and again, as advertised on John's website. The plants from Peter's and John's seeds are completely different. They appear to be quite different strains.
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I have two phenotypes of what I now refer to as Not Locato after it became evident that a Manzano shaped strain had at some point mingled with the Locato. How did the yield of the more true to the PI 387838 accession description from Peter compare yield wise?
 
Wow nice haul Aussie. If you need to offload some, I'm in Canberra as well. Never had any Rocoto before, but harry keeps telling me to get started growing them lol
 
harry said:
I have two phenotypes of what I now refer to as Not Locato after it became evident that a Manzano shaped strain had at some point mingled with the Locato. How did the yield of the more true to the PI 387838 accession description from Peter compare yield wise?
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The yield from Peter's mini rocoto was very good, at least in terms of pod numbers. Didn't weigh them but would say is that if it is highest total weight of harvest that you're looking for then this is not the variety to pick.

Shurbryn said:
Wow nice haul Aussie. If you need to offload some, I'm in Canberra as well. Never had any Rocoto before, but harry keeps telling me to get started growing them lol
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Hey send me a pm and we can sort something out
 
Impressive Aussie!

I looked up the climate in Canberra and it appears ideal for what I studied about Pubescens growing conditions. Summers are moderately hot in the day and then nights are cool, yes?

I vowed to not mess with them again in the Florida climate - real hot in the day and hot at night! But, I'm inspired by your photos and am currently trying to germinate some beautiful Manzano peppers I got at the Mexican market.

Thanks for sharing.
 
Bob_B said:
Impressive Aussie!

I looked up the climate in Canberra and it appears ideal for what I studied about Pubescens growing conditions. Summers are moderately hot in the day and then nights are cool, yes?

I vowed to not mess with them again in the Florida climate - real hot in the day and hot at night! But, I'm inspired by your photos and am currently trying to germinate some beautiful Manzano peppers I got at the Mexican market.

Thanks for sharing.
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Thanks Bob! I think that you are right - we have close to the ideal climate here. I grew in part shade this year. The sun is brutally intense here in summer. Last summer I tried to grow in direct sunlight and my plants did not like it - stunted growth, bleached leaves, pitted and sunburnt fruit. I know that others have had success with direct sunlight so I suggest that you try different locations and persevere. Good luck! 
 
Aussie said:
 
Only grew one to maturity (I generally plant 3 or 4 seeds and keep the strongest plant). Peter (Semillas) calls PI 387838 the mini rocoto. I bought seed from Peter and grew this one out, too. The mini rocoto pods were as advertised on Peter's website, i.e. mini sized. The pods that I have from John's locato (thechilliman.biz) are a similar shape and colour  but about twice as long and again, as advertised on John's website. The plants from Peter's and John's seeds are completely different. They appear to be quite different strains. 
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Hi
 
Nice peppers you have there! Would you mind posting some pics of your plants?
 
This is the first year I grow Rocotos. They are flowering now, very excited, hope they set fruit.
 
D
 
Walti72 said:
Hi
 
Nice peppers you have there! Would you mind posting some pics of your plants?
 
This is the first year I grow Rocotos. They are flowering now, very excited, hope they set fruit.
 
D
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Sure... the plants are in pots in part shade at the side of my house. Sorry about the quality of these shots - the plants are packed in pretty close together. They seem to like it this way. The plants range from around 3 feet to 8 feet tall, depending on variety but I prune them back a lot, especially when they have fruit, as you can see from the last of these pics. These are the biggest pods that I have growing at the moment (even bigger than the "giant" rocotos from Semillas seed stock). They are unripe yellows (canarios). Most of these plants grow like vines. I have pruned them back to just a stump but they just keep coming back! They almost seem to benefit from pruning. 
 

 

 
 
Inspiration for me :fireball: . I have tried a few times in the summer to grow them but the humidity and heat devoured them even in the shade. So I started some in late september hoping to get a winter harvest . 
 
I have one rocoto and one  manzano plant growing .
 
 
I have been told they require much more nutrients than most species. Would you tend to agree? 
 
Thanks guys! 
 
 
 
romy6 said:
 
I have been told they require much more nutrients than most species. Would you tend to agree? 
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Through winter I don't feed them at all - growth is very slow here at that time. When they start to take off in spring, I feed them every watering with a N-rich soluble fert. This is when they need it. Once they have enough pods set then I drop back to once per week and switch to a fert with less N and more P. Put simply, once they start taking off, I feed my rocotos as I would feed a tomato plant in a container. 
 
I guess that my plants have a lot of leaves (and big leaves) because they are responding to the part-shade and the N-rich ferts early on. Some might see this as a waste but I don't mind pruning and it works for me this way. As you can see, in addition to the foliage, the plants also produce lots of pods. 
 
Hope this helps.
 
Aussie said:
Thanks guys! 
 
 
 
 
Through winter I don't feed them at all - growth is very slow here at that time. When they start to take off in spring, I feed them every watering with a N-rich soluble fert. This is when they need it. Once they have enough pods set then I drop back to once per week and switch to a fert with less N and more P. Put simply, once they start taking off, I feed my rocotos as I would feed a tomato plant in a container. 
 
I guess that my plants have a lot of leaves (and big leaves) because they are responding to the part-shade and the N-rich ferts early on. Some might see this as a waste but I don't mind pruning and it works for me this way. As you can see, in addition to the foliage, the plants also produce lots of pods. 
 
Hope this helps.
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Beautiful plants you have there, thank you for the pics.
 
I had my Rocoto's in mid/afternoon sun, and they did not seem to have liked the heat, after moving them to get just a little bit of afternoon sun, they seems much happier and flowering. Dont look like they are going to set fruit yet, but the season still have a few months left. My other peppers does not seem to mind when they get sun or how much.
 
I have only manage to track down the normal Rocoto seeds here in South Africa, but still very glad I did. Have been wanting to grow them for ages!
 
Also thanx for sharing your feeding habits, you are doing something right there :-)
 
D
 
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