Difference Between Tomatoes and Peppers

[Mark_Thompson]

What do y’all do differently when growing peppers, if anything? Any difference in fertilizing, soil prep, more/less water? Wife is on a pepper eating kick so gonna try a few. Bell/sweet peppers, nothing spicy, if that makes any difference in your answer. Thanks

[Cornelius_Gotchberg]

This here's our mostly Sweet Pepper lineup:
Beaver Dam (a WESconsin developed variety 500-1000 SHU)
Biggie Chile Hybrid (450-600 SHU)
Carmen Hybrid
Giant Marconi
Golden Greek Pepperoncini (100-500 SHU)
Goliath Sweet Hybrid
Gypsy Hybrid
​Mama Mia Giallo Hybrid
Numex Big Jim (500-3500 SHU)
Purple Beauty
Roulette Hybrid (~100 SKU)
Sweet Sunset Hybrid

We prefer larger, thicker walled varieties and (SPECIAL thanks to @karstopography) absolutely LUV 'em grilled just the firm side of al dente with any number of cheese/dip inside!

The Gotch

[Seven Bends]

Tomatoes are heavy feeders, while peppers are only light to medium feeders (source for this tidbit is Virginia Tech extension service, not folklore). We fertilize our tomatoes fairly heavily at planting, then side-dress at blossoming/fruit set and repeat monthly. We fertilize our peppers lightly or not at all at planting and then side-dress at blossoming/fruit set, then generally no more fertilizer after that. (Note, we have clay soil that holds nutrients well, so there's already something in the soil for the peppers to work with even if we don't fertilize at planting.)

We usually plant out our peppers about a week later than our tomatoes.

Bacterial leaf spot is a big problem here now, so we mostly have to grow resistant varieties. Only a few of the heirloom and non-resistant hybrids I've grown in recent years have managed to produce a decent crop.

Some mid-afternoon shade can help in mid-summer with hot sun and high heat, but maybe that's not a factor in your climate.

[karstopography]

Peppers here do best in my beds with loamy, well drained soil. They appreciate a little filtered light in the heat of a sunny afternoon. I’ve been lightly side dressing a mix of Calcium nitrate, cottonseed meal, and langbeinite after prepping the beds with cotton burr compost, cottonseed meal, bone meal, langbeinite and mustard/brassica foliage and my peppers seem very healthy this year. I too don’t feed my peppers as much as the tomatoes.

Best sweet/bell peppers, I’ve grown here are, one, Giant Aconcagua, huge, pointy, productive, sweet when ripe, no heat, handles our likely most of the time even more humid and hot summers than Hawaii well, although we haven’t been getting as much rain during the pepper season as maybe the windward side of the Hawaiian Islands get.

Jimmy Nardello struggles in the peak of summer here, but does fairly well before the peak heat/humidity strikes. Very sweet when ripe.

Bell peppers in general all prefer the not quite full summer weather here and shrink in size and vigor in hot weather.

Frank’s peppers are tiny plants with big production potential. Delicious, sweet when ripe, zero heat, moderate sized fruit. Very fast to maturity.

Calabrian caviar is a beautiful pepper. I’ve yet to eat one, I’m not clear if they have any heat. I decided to dry the four ripe ones I have. Gatherer’s Gold, another large and golden beauty, two are resting there on my counter, but not yet eaten any.

Corbaci is a sweet when ripe, very prolific, zero heat, does well in the hot weather pepper.

Shishito peppers are amazingly productive right through the worst of summer, but there can be a hot one in the mix.

Poblano, Guajillo, Pasilla, Anaheim, most Aji types, jalapeños, Serrano, Fresno, anything that has some heat tend to thrive in hot weather.

[bower]

Peppers don't root from the stem like tomatoes do, so don't plant deeper than the cotyledons.
For setting, peppers do nominally like moderate temperatures (optimally low 70's) almost more so than tomatoes but are not so fussy about day/night temperature differences. They will probably love your climate. In my greenhouse they did better with midday shade.
Pepper flowers have nectar (tomatoes don't) which makes them super popular with bees therefore lots of crossed seeds.

[maxjohnson]

Well this year I learned that pepper don't recover as well from frost damage compared to tomato, and probably should be planted a little later than tomato as a result.

[Paulf]

Peppers, here all sweet varieties, get started from seed about two weeks earlier than tomatoes and are kept on heating pads at 80+ degrees. They are planted out after tomatoes by a few days. At planting nothing special is done to the soil since the entire garden is treated as a single unit according to a professional soil test.

My peppers are in the 6 inch range when planted and for the first month they do not show much growth, so a side dressing of 12-12-12 fertilizer is done and a foliar feed of plant food applied to give the plants a boost. This is applied again the first of July. Here because of the short season all the peppers are less than 65 days to maturity. They really begin to produce in early August but not ripen until September...pushing right up to our frost date. Most years there are more green peppers than ripe ones, but we still like the greenies.

It may be the season, may be the soil, may be me, but peppers no matter how hard I try do not produce like I want them to. We like sweet bells and longer peppers also. My favorites are Aconcagua and Franks Sweet. For a couple of years I have grown out the colorful snacking peppers we buy at the grocery store with some good success. I read this thread hoping to get a few pointers on doing better.

[worth1]

In my situation it comes to one thing.
Most peppers here do shed blossoms during the heat.
Tomatoes do.
Never gave it much thought on the difference in growing them.

[karstopography]

It will be interesting to see if peppers there in Hawaii will be susceptible to fungal or other diseases.

Peppers go in the garden here generally at the end of February into March with the seed being started near the end of the year. In my experience, sweet peppers are rarely very sweet while still green. Many of the non bell sweet peppers are pretty tasteless or not great when green.

An end of February transplanted sweet pepper will generally start getting ripe fruit towards the end of May into June. As the summer progresses into July and August, the numbers and quality of the fruit with sweet peppers tends to diminish, but if the plants are cared for and remain healthy the peppers will go on and produce a nice crop in the fall.

As compared to tomatoes, I have much better success with peppers setting fruit in the worst of the summer heat versus tomatoes and much better success getting peppers to produce in our fall season.

Hawaii with the generally cooler Pacific waters modifying, lessening the worst of the heat and tropical sun, ought to be pretty favorable for growing peppers, that is if rain and disease doesn’t factor in in some way.

[Yak54]

Well this year I learned that pepper don't recover as well from frost damage compared to tomato, and probably should be planted a little later than tomato as a result.

Years ago the Stokes seed catalog used to specify not to put out pepper plants into the garden till the night time temps were 55 deg or above and referencing a June 10th planting date. I don't think they still say this in their current catalog but then I haven't received them for 10 years. Anyway I always followed this advice and always have had very productive pepper plants no matter what the variety so I still follow this. I always start my pepper seeds a week later than my tomato seeds .

[Mark_Thompson]

Thanks all. Lots of info here. I’ve grown peppers before with mixed results, so I’m not a total virgin. I haven’t seen them be quite as susceptible as tomatoes to fungal issues. They have gotten many of the same pests. This will be the first time I plant ten or so and give them attention instead of treating them as an afterthought.

[Shule]

What do y’all do differently when growing peppers, if anything? Any difference in fertilizing, soil prep, more/less water? Wife is on a pepper eating kick so gonna try a few. Bell/sweet peppers, nothing spicy, if that makes any difference in your answer. Thanks

First of all, it's helpful to start peppers earlier than tomatoes, if possible.

I water peppers a lot more than tomatoes. They like deep waterings, too (deep watering can reduce the number of waterings needed).

I grow peppers with black plastic. They grow a lot better this way. Bare soil doesn't work out so well, if they're in the ground. Lacking black plastic, mulch is better than nothing. Lacking mulch, growing in containers is better than directly in the ground.

For me, peppers don't take up a lot of space compared with tomatoes. So, in my garden, I don't need to cage peppers. In Hawaii, your peppers might get huge, though.

There are some disease differences between peppers and tomatoes. If you grow in containers, I don't recommend growing peppers in the same container very many times in a row.

For a bell pepper, I recommend Canary Bell. It's pretty easy to grow, and it's prolific and tasty.

Fertilization is probably more helpful for peppers versus tomatoes, but they're pretty similar in their fertilization needs.

Peppers seem to be more salt-tolerant than tomatoes, and even seem to enjoy a soil with a higher salt index than most tomatoes enjoy. I think that's one of the keys to bigger bell peppers. By salt, I mean chemical salt (I don't mean sodium chloride particularly).

[JRinPA]

What do y’all do differently when growing peppers, if anything? Any difference in fertilizing, soil prep, more/less water? Wife is on a pepper eating kick so gonna try a few. Bell/sweet peppers, nothing spicy, if that makes any difference in your answer. Thanks

Sweet peppers versus tomatoes... more water, hotter soil (thin black mulch is great), ag19 tunnel for further warmth until they push it hard. A good bit of 10-10-10 in the row when I remember. Plant them up to the cotyledons or a little past. I feel like should add phosphorus when they start fruiting, but never do. Did bone meal this year. Starting peppers about 5-6 weeks earlier. I don't prune them, I do a florida weave once or twice, then box-diamond across the double row to further support.

edit:Sweet pepper do well for me at 12" in row and 12" between the double row, spacing. Much tighter than tomatoes, even for me.

Jalapenos and hot peppers I grow the same way but less water at times to keep them hot, so with drip tape I try to keep the hots in their own row with control valve.

Tomatoes rarely get watered when near ripening, and not often before that unless they really need it. Tomatoes get single or double stemmed, for the most part, and never get fertilized in season. I should get some TTF or such and try that, never do. They see a lot of compost and fish in the rows, but I have learned the lesson of too much nitrogen+heavy pruning. Weird things happen, too much nutrients and they grow leaves out the back of the fruits trusses, get crazy number of flowers per truss, etc. So I don't use 10-10-10 for prepping tomatoes rows anymore, but might again if using one plant in a cage with lots of room.

I wish I could say all my tomatoes are always great, and it seems I can say that for a few varieties now, but those are the ones that seem to like single stemming. Growing in cages, unpruned, I had different favorite tomatoes.

[bower]

@GoDawgs I remember reading about how you prune your pepper seedlings. My peppers are just getting to the point that I would have to make that decision, could you refresh me on how that's done?
Our season is so short, I usually don't prune because the earlier the buds the better. But it might be a really good tip for Mark, with the year round growing potential.

[GoDawgs]

@bower, I have the following in my files. I copied it from Johnnie's Seeds a while back but failed to also copy off the link, something I usually do.

Growing Peppers – Developing Branches & harvesting

From Johnny’s Seeds:

Peppers grow as a 1 stemmed plant until the first fruit is set, when the plant branches for the first time. Remove the initial pepper that is set in the first split before it develops. This will give the plant time to develop adequate leaf
cover to support a fruit load. It is typical to remove the flowers at the second and third nodes, but if all conditions are optimized some growers allow fruit to set after removing just the first one.

Every node after the initial split will result in 1 leaf, 1 pepper, and 2 branches.
Field peppers may sometimes form multiple branches per node, but greenhouse peppers are bred to form 2 even branches.

At each node after the initial split, choose the strongest of the 2 branches
to continue forming the stem. Terminate the other branch after it has formed
1 leaf. This involves cutting off the flower and 2 other branches at the first node of each lateral branch. This leaves one leaf to develop, called the flag leaf. This leaf will protect the peppers from sunscald and help prevent blossom end rot.

Do not prune within 8 inches of the tip of the plant, and take care not to cause damage to the growing point.

Prune every 2 weeks, or after about 6” of growth since the last pruning. Pepper plants will set 4-5 fruits before aborting the next few flowers. This is normal, for the plant to set fruit in “flushes” and not set every single fruit. Remove fruit if they are deformed or unmarketable to allow the plant to put energy into setting other fruits farther up the plant.

I found I didn't have the time to fuss that much over peppers. There was something on You Tube where the guy only snipped off the terminals of branches one time when the plants were at least 8" tall. He was showing his kid how he does it and also showed the resulting plants. They were a lot more bushy. Trying that I found that although the plants were more bushy I couldn't notice much increase in production. I can't find that YT in my files now. Sorry! But here's a You Tube link with lots of stories about this, probably including the one I saw:

https://www.youtube.com/results?search_ ... ng+peppers

[bower]

Thanks @GoDawgs for theory plus practical experience!

[JRinPA]

I would grow stuff so much differently if I had to buy plants. Last year I grew...90 sweet peppers, 25 jalapenos, and 5 hot peppers. In the 30x4 bed that is 12" high. They do so well in there, with drip tape support. This year I saw $5 per plant at walmart...$600 eh?

My pepper plants will be ugly this year, since they got frost pruned.

So for the johnny's pepper growing, it is double stemmed + 1 leaf for shade? How is it supported? I have one row of sweet pepper this year under a CRW A trellis, opposite my tomatoes. That sounds like the way to go for them, my kind of growing, the spacing and support are already set. But otherwise it would seem that double stemming peppers would have them falling over.

[Mark_Thompson]

My peppers are pretty much duds. Bought as starters from Lowes or started from seed their growth is underwhelming and their susceptibility to disease is worse than I thought. Will follow up with pictures hopefully tomorrow.

The lone exception is Roulette Hybrid from @Cornelius_Gotchberg The one plant is massive and seems super happy, but doesn’t have as many fruits as I would expect. Are they similar to tomatoes, could that be a sign of too much N?

Roulette in foreground, duds in background

[Ken4230]

What do y’all do differently when growing peppers, if anything? Any difference in fertilizing, soil prep, more/less water? Wife is on a pepper eating kick so gonna try a few. Bell/sweet peppers, nothing spicy, if that makes any difference in your answer. Thanks

First of all, it's helpful to start peppers earlier than tomatoes, if possible
There are some disease differences between peppers and tomatoes. If you grow in containers, I don't recommend growing peppers in the same container very many times in a row.
Fertilization is probably more helpful for peppers versus tomatoes, but they're pretty similar in their fertilization needs.

I start my peppers Jan. 1st, no heat so they can grow slow and be ready to put out the latter part of April. 12" spacing both directions. I do plant fairly deep, seem to help stabilize the peppers. Had no idea that you can prune peppers. Have out at least 2 doz. Karmen(came that way from Titania's), Gypsy, Nadapeno, Sweet Banana and Giant Marconi. I am overrun with peppers, give them a healthy dose of Bone Meal/Blood Meal at planting. I give them a light feeding of triple ten and Bloom Booster when they start blooming. I don't worry about water, with all the rains we have plus most of my beds have Mel's Mix in them.

[Cole_Robbie]

Pepper seedlings are more cold sensitive than tomatoes and don't seem to recover as well from cold damage. In growing them, organic matter content of the soil made a big difference for me. The other difference I remember is seed cost, mostly for hybrid bells. The only way I was able to grow a bell pepper that looked like it was off a grocery store shelf was to buy very expensive hybrid seeds. A buck a seed is nuts, but worth it for a market garden.