Gardening: Jalapenos

This is the second year I have grown jalapeños. I tried jalapeños because I like to make salsa and my best friend's recipes use a lot of jalapeños. My father also likes jalapeños on just about everything. So this was something we would eat.

The first year, I planted 2-6inch tall jalapeño  plants. Within a week, one jalapeno plant was eaten by snails. 

The second plant was attacked by white flies within a month. The white flies look like white scales on the underside of the leaves. I tried to just wipe them off, thinking that it was just some kind of fungus or hard water deposits. It got some off, but not all. Then the landscaper caught me and said that they are white flies and that I need to spray them. I sprayed them with a natural spray and was able to get a total harvest of 4 jalapeños...not impressed. The spray was just Canola oil and water...I paid for it before I found out the ingredients. This year I will try making my own instead. The landscaper said it is unusual for them to attack jalapeño plants.

So this year, they sold them in a tray of 9. They were younger plants, maybe 3 inches tall. While transplanting them, 1 stem broke off. I didn't have enough planters for the 8 to have their own planter, so I put 2 each. So far, the snails have stuck to tomato plants, but I am going to add snail killer to all of them.

When they start flowering and growing, I will give more updates.