Chinese pepper suffers. Please help🙏
Hi everybody, my Chinese pepper plant isn’t doing well. I just bought it two days ago and it’s already suffering. Some leaves are turning yellow and dropping. What’s the issue? My plant is inside, near a south west facing window. Please help 🙏🙏
10” pot with drainage
Last watered 5 months ago
12
Best Answer
I’ve got this plant as well! I haven’t seen many people with it. However, looking at your leaves and the coloring, it does look like it’s got a little pathogen infection. You probably want to, after letting it acclimate, change all the soil, wash off the roots, and clean and sanitize the pot you are using. From there, use a well-draining soil and just watch the watering. They can get fussy if given too much water. Just an earthy (so chunky soil medium) would work great for it! You might want to watch and see if treating the plant is necessary, but you can start there.
@HunkyMiro99 as a rule of thumb you give a week to week and half or longer to acclimate, then transplant; Watering- wait till the two top inches is dry, just stick your finger or get a water meter. Or a water reminder. These guys like a lot of humidity, so make sure it’s getting enough humidity, they like lots of light too. I’d recommend using a good potting mix mixed with a good chunky citrus mix or orchid bark mix they love it. You can even add tree fern fiber in with it, but I’d mix all those or find a well draining soil with tree fern fiber and pot it with that.. make sure trim regularly and lastly if you aren’t already using it, try using a monosilicic acid you can get it on Amazon. But you use it in every watering, and remember to water on the sides of pot to make sure the roots pull towards the water pull the roots. That will definitely help as well. Let me know how it goes!
@Idplantthat Ok so the situation is much worse. It dropped a lot more leaves and the remaining leaves are becoming a lighter green ad wilting a bit, I didn’t repot yet as I read around that this might only be stress and that I should absolutely not repot and it might kill it. Why do think it’s a pathogen infection? Do you still think I should repot, I’m really scared to kill it. I also put the pot in a plate with water and expanded clay to give humidity
@HunkyMiro99 it honestly looks worse than I think it is. I’d do my best to let it dry out a little; it could be a little of a pathogen infection. I’d highly recommend getting some monosilicic acid and start using it with every watering; that will encourage new growth and prevent any damages moving forward (in theory, nothing unfortunately is foolproof). You can trim back the dead leaves and branches so the plant solely focuses on healing itself and not trying to also heal damaged dying parts (it will try, and you want to refocus the plant’s direction). I hope this makes sense. They do like higher humidity and can be dramatic. If the soil has a smell to it, then you most definitely have a pathogen infection. Does that all make sense?
Ok, little update. Since last time I removed all the dried and damaged leaves (yes, pretty much all of them). Then I treated at the start of the week with isopropyl alcohol to remove brown scale and now I noticed yesterday that many of the gems are starting to become leaves. Very happy of course but I’d like to know what’s the game plan from now on. Do I spray again with isopropyl alcohol to prevent brown scale to come back?
