• Giant Marconi Pepper

• Light: Full sun
• Fruit size: 8 inches by 3 inches
• Matures: 62 days
• Plant spacing: 18 to 24 inches

A 2001 All-America Selections winner, ‘Giant Marconi’ impressed judges with its vigor, high yields, large fruit size and complex sweet flavor. This cultivar produces fruits for harvest 70 to 72 days after planting from transplants. The narrow, 6- to 8-inch-long (15 to 20 cm) fruits are green and ripen to scarlet red. They are produced on large, bushy plants. These peppers can be eaten green or red, raw or cooked and have a slightly smoky sweet flavor. Fully mature peppers are ideal for roasting.

Soil & Water: Peppers require deeply-worked, well-drained soil with plenty of added organic matter and a pH of 6.0-6.8. Water deeply, but don’t over water.

Planting & Growing: Start seeds indoors 8 weeks before the last frost. Direct seeding is not recommended. Stake to keep fruit off the ground and mulch for disease and weed control.

Harvesting & Storage: Harvest the first fruits early to encourage continued production through the season. Cut (don’t pull) the fruit from the stems. These peppers may be harvested from the green stage through the color changes.

Native to tropical America, these annuals had been grown and selected by Native Americans since pre-history times. In fact, their specific region of origin is still unknown due to distribution by man. Peppers became available to Europeans when the new and old worlds connected. Since then, many unique selections have been developed in Europe—particularly in warm Mediterranean countries like Spain, Italy and Greece where they grow well.

Peppers are bushy plants with rigid, brittle stems and thin, often broad, dark green leaves. Their flowers are inconspicuous, five-petaled and white. Peppers have firm, fleshy, hollow fruits that may be harvested green or allowed to mature to red, orange, yellow, purple-brown, or near ivory, depending on the selection. On the interior they are lined with spongy ribbing which supports many small, flattened, rounded seeds. Bell peppers are all members of the Grossum groups, due to their large size and distinctive shape.

Green fruits have a sharper taste and mature are sweeter, but the heat of a pepper is what most are interested in. Many peppers are spicy hot. Their heat is produced by a chemical called capsaicin measured in units called Scoville units against the Scoville scale (http:///FactFile/Scoville_Scale.asp). The purer the capsaicin, the hotter the pepper and the higher the Scoville rating. Pepper seeds carry more heat than the flesh of the fruit. Still, bell peppers have the lowest heat of all and are almost never spicy.

Bell peppers are warm season vegetables that are easy to grow, if you can provide them with the correct conditions. Full sun, warmth, fertile, perfectly drained soil and regular feeding are required for good growth and fruit production. Peppers generally take 60 to 90 days to harvest. Some vascular wilts and fungal problems can befall them, but overall they are not needy. Proper spacing will keep diseases at bay and help with fruit production, so plant according to the grower’s guidelines.

Peppers can be ornamental as well as tasty, so enjoy them as bedding or container plants as well as vegetable garden standbys.