Chilli plant

[Craig.a.c]

Not to sure what area I would post this, but since they produce a chilli I guess you could call them flowering.
I saved this from the dumpster behind our local B*$%*ings along with a few other plants.
When I found it, most of the leaves had fallen of and the rest were looking like they wanted to fall off.
Since repotting it and giving it a good soak everyday it has already produced 2 big chillis that went into a pasta I made the other day.

Anyones else used something similar in bonsai?

[kvan64]

Hi, I've seen daisies used as bonsai and guess you could use chilli as bonsai too. I have over 10 chili trees including the NJ, the hottest chilli in the world. The problem with chilli plants as bonsai is - you have to prepare to replace them in about 5 years time.
Cheers,
DK

[Istari]

I've had sucess with one to many seedlings of recent I thought i might see some die back over the winter considering some of them were still little but coming onto spring now their will to live suprises me. This being said and me being new to bonsai consider the opportunity to practise some of my skills while not worrying about doing the wrong thing. I've got about 10 1 year old plants to play with. Might experiment and see what works what doesnt. Im sure to keep you all posted

[Glenda]

I currently have custody of 4 of my son's chillis - a yellow Havenero, a red Hav, a red jalapeno and another I am not sure of. The Havs are HOT (and I like chilli) and interestingly the yellow is MUCH hotter than the red. I have a freezer FULL of yellow chillis.

All of them suffer from die back at the drop of a hat, but reshoot elsewhere when that happens. Because of that I would be reluctant to try to train anything because you never know when a branch will die. I

Glenda

[Istari]

Im not sure what type of chilli these are, they produce a very small (maybe size of a ten cent peice) and are definalty the hottest ouchy hurt fire mouth chilli i've ever had. If planted in the ground they can grow a decent size, taller then a person. But ive only got pots to keep them at my apartment so they havent passed 2ft.

I planted the seedlings from its mother which funnilly enough I also planted from a seedling when I was still living at my parents property up on the north coast. My girlfriend is somewhat a chilli fanatic so I planted about 20 to many

The growth seems a little stunted given that its colder down here but I havent had any die on me yet, I had a little time this afternoon and repotted the ones which I needed to get rid of so the rest had some room to grow into decent sized fruiting plants.

I dont want to get any hopes up, they are small enough to be considerd seedlings and far from bonsai but I thought I would make the most to get some hands on practise repotting, pruning the taproot and styling whats left.

I'll take some shots tomorrow as it got dark on me while I was doing it but I keen how things might progress.

[Yuffie]

I have just dug up a two year old chilly plant from the garden and put it in a bonsai pot ~ I've never done any bonsai before and still don't know much about it, but I thought it'd be fun just playing around with it since I've got a few pots laying around. It's got a trunk about the diameter of a 20 cent coin and produce chillies that are too fiddley to pick for cooking coz they're really tiny.. maybe smaller than half the size of a 5 cent coin.. hope it survives my brutal trimmings..

[Istari]

Im sure it will, my girlfriends father just took vigeriously to his chilli's with a pair of secaturs. Its not how I would have done it but he sort of just cut the tops off every branch and all were leafless after winter. They are just starting to grow some new leaf now, Im sure with the temps you've got up there in brisbane it can survive a repotting and some hacking if it can survive a cold winter and random pruning down here

Reminds me I never put the pics up from my efforts the other week. Just like to remind everyone that it was play around with them or get rid of them. *still has his bonsai L plates on*

Before (pre winter - just some leaf loss since then)

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After my discoveries of what lay beneath

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There were a few that didnt have anything interesting when I dug down to find out. seeing as how I had the numbers and nothing else to do with them (I really hate killing plants, my girlfriend had to get rid of some excess tomato seedlings that werent doing so well) I'd seen a couple of posts on fusing and seen some wireing done on you tube so it was time to get my hands dirty

Heres my attempt:

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You'll be pleased to know that all are doing well, new leaf is awakening on just about all of them