How to plant 🌶️ upside down chili peppers.

Plants that usually flop, like chives, peppers or tomatoes, are best planted from the bottom of the pot.

That leaves the top side available for any other kind of plant that never needs to be tied up on a lattice. I have lots of upside down plants, but I thought chili peppers would be great upside down. That's because you won't have to tie them up. They will be hanging!

We start off with two identical pots and we want to plan the holes that we will plant them in. The problem I had in the past is that when you water and upside down plant, the water runs down the stem and turns it all black. I'm not sure if it will affect the plant, the others are great, but just so that the plant looks nicer we want to avoid that if possible.

Here are some pictures of my chive, garlic, and a ginger plant. I water them sparingly so the stems are not so bad.

So, the first step is to have two identical pots made of plastic. We're going to turn one of them upside down and take a propane torch and put it near the first hole that we want to expand and dimple toward the inside of the pot. Less than a half second is enough to do the trick.

The dimpling keeps extra water from running up and over its edge and down the plant stem.

As you can see by the picture on the right, extra water will drain from a hole that's much lower than where the stem will be coming out. That will reduce any dirt and water from draining down the stem of the plant.

I used a cone shaped adapter that comes with every tube of silicone. That just helps to shape the plastic as we make a place for each stem.

As you can see, I have a lot of chili pepper seeds that have germinated and there are spinach seeds in there as well, but they take forever. This is a rush job that I've been meaning to do for a while. These little guys need some dirt!

Since I have a lot of plans to plant, and they will not be crowded if they're hanging, I'm going to try to put eight plants in this pot.

I am drilling four more holes, staggered from the ones we have already opened up and dimpled.

The small hole is is enough to get started. Just a fraction of a second is all it takes for a propane torch to soften plastic and then a cone shaped object will open up a hole.

the pot is all done.

Here we have the finished pot. I put tape over the holes that will be for drainage so you can see what we are working with for planting.

Next we flip the pot, add a very thin layer of moss to it. I like to use Moss because it holds moisture better than soil. But we will need some soil to give the plants nutrition.

We now have an inch or so of dirt and moss in the pot. Remember that second of the two identical pots I mentioned in the beginning? Place that inside this one. We are going to sandwich the dirt between the bottoms of two pots. Then add water to get all of it wet.

You can let that sit in the sink for a little while to drain.This second pot will be usable later after the plants have grown a bit. We will take it out and it can be used for another plant.

Now comes the messy part!

We flip the whole thing over onto the countertop and we push to drain out some more water.

I am pushing mine with a solid steel section of rod that weighs about five pounds.

This will be draining for the next few weeks while the plants grow and get some leaves, spreading their Roots out so they don't fall out of the holes when they go upside down.

I had the pot sitting with the weight on top for the entire time that I was riding this post. Now the bottom is dry and I can tape it to help mitigate leakage. I will still have to put the pot on a drain pan for the duration after the planting.

Now our project is one unit. It can be picked up or moved around and it won't affect the plants that we are about to put into it.

Next, we make a hole in the moss/soil to receive the tiny roots that need it.

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I will have to water these with a spoon or eye dropper for a few weeks, until the roots have a grip on the soil.

Here is a picture of the largest of my Jalapeno plants living as if in China. They thrive perfectly.

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