Zone 7a, Kentucky USA. I read about over-wintering peppers and tried it out last year, but sadly none of them survived. I pruned them appropriately, and kept them in my garage with infrequent watering once temperatures started getting into the 40s at night. We had wild temperature fluctuations (high 60s F during the day and low 30s F at night) and I’m not sure if that hindered the process.
I would love to try again this year, but I’m wondering what others’ experiences are.
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My chili pequin planted in the ground comes back each year in 8a, but it’s native here.
I overwinter jalapenos. I live in a very warm climate, so I’ll just cover them if I know it will dip below freezing. Worked last year and I’ll try again this winter.
My aunt is a big gardener in 7a (piedmont NC) and has overwintered jalapenos a few times and declared it not worth it for her, apparently the yields aren’t much/any bigger than new seedlings and it’s a nontrivial amount of work and space to keep them overwintered. If you try again and have different results I’d love to hear about it!
I overwintered some peppers once by just bringing the plant inside and throwing it under a grow light. So not really doing the “prune and make it go dormant” approach that seems popular.
I did accidentally do that once when a frost killed all my leaves/soft stems, and I just put the pot into my basement expecting to plant something else the next spring. When I put it outside the next spring, new growth came off the dead-looking woody sticks.
I did it one year with jalapeños and will likely never do it again. The yield on them was actually less than the freshly planted. I think the winter just over-stressed the plant and it never fully recovered. Zone 8a.
I’m trying this year. My pepper plants didn’t sprout until July and didn’t mature enough to produce anything (thank you cold, cloudy, rainy UK summer!) so I’m going to keep them indoors near a window, and hopefully they’ll have enough time to produce next year.
I’ll try again this year. No room inside so I’ll put up some clear plastic bags around em and try to make a makeshift greenhouse for those days below freezing.
I did it too late last year and they all died. No room inside to bring em in.
Yes. I was able to keep my ghost chili, Casper, alive for 7 years.
I know they say to keep them in a dimly lit environment and to water infrequently, but I just treated mine like a house plant and it did great. I dug it up, pruned it, put it in a pot with its soil and some fertilizer, and kept it by a window.
Edit: found a pic from year 7
