A lot of bell peppers will turn from green to red.

"California Wonder" is an old favourite and "Shepherd" is another. It should be easy to find seeds or seedlings of these varieties.

Linda

It can take a long time for them to ripen to red. A long, long time...... Requiring a lot of patience. Check the DTM on any variety you are considering. Some climates dont have seasons long enough for some peppers.

I agree a long long time to ripen peppers. I start mine in February in zone 6/7 to get a real early start. I am growing purple bell peppers this year. Also trying to grow the Galapagos pepper. Bell peppers seeds should be easy to find in stores or online.

All peppers eventually ripen and change colour. Have you checked out this FAQ?

I find bell peppers take a very long time to grow large and ripen. I now mostly grow lunchbox peppers instead. They're just as sweet as the bells, much more prolific and ripen sooner.

If you're interested in trying some, buy a package of these peppers from the grocery store and germinate the seeds from the fresh peppers.

Daren

While the vast majority of bell peppers ultimately turn red the season length to do so varies. I had always thought Red Knight was an early ripening one but this year I'm growing Sprinter, touted to be early- but the seeds aren't cheap. Over the last few years I've picked early colored bell peppers from most of the minibells: Cute Stuff Red or Cajun Belle (slightly hot).

I have grown many larger red bell varieties and other than Red Knight I liked Aristotle, Archimedes, Revolution,Snapper, Colossal and Vidi. All of these are green when unripe. If you try a purple or brown bell most of those also turn red as a ripe color but you have an unripe choice other than green.

I agree with void. I think Carmen is one of the first of sweet Italian roasting types to turn red. I tend to be judicious about which peppers get picked leaving a few early fruits to ripen to red. I'm probably not going to grow a lot of large bells this summer although I had bells turning red eventually. I've been growing my peppers in a high tunnel with the side rolled up. It gets hotter in there plus I have less problems due to rain since they don't get rained on. I water them with a hose/sprinkler.

The tomato and pepper plants I buy, I buy from a local grower. She grows a wide variety and chooses varieties suited to NH. (zone 5)

Defrost49, I had a few problems with heavy rain weighing down my peppers last year. Would you please better explain your method of how you 'cover' them to prevent such problems please? Do they still get lots of sun?

I have a "high tunnel" which is 6mm greenhouse fabric covered wooden framed structure which my husband built. But even with this structure, the weight of peppers can make plants fall over. I have started putting the wire tomato cages around them. You can see in photo the pepper plant with red peppers laying on its side but next to it the other pepper plant is nice and upright. That one is in a cage. Don't wait too long which is what happened to me with this plant.

Do you use the tomato cage by having the smallest diameter at the bottom? Is that best for peppers ?

Best? No. There are many ways to support pepper plants but any form of support/stake/cage is better than nothing at all. But yes, if you use the 3-4 ring cage things then just as with any other plant they are used on the small diameter is at the bottom with the legs stuck into the ground.

Dave

High tunnel peppers are quite different than field grown (outside) peppers. I never used support for close to 1600 field grown plants every year but same plants grown under plastic will grow much taller and lodge without support. But cages for peppers inside causes too many spacing restrictions. I use a Florida weave stake and twine support with stakes every third plant within the row. That allows me to plant about 450 pepper plants in my 20'x96' tunnel and still have 4 ft along one side for basil. I agree with the horn peppers being earlier along with the minibells I mentioned earlier. In fact I don't plant the larger bell peppers in my tunnel. Sprinter will be my largest red bell inside, complemented by Catriona (yel.),and Orange Blaze. Those three should be colored in 60 days from transplant. I'm also planting a complement of the med size bullhorns: Carmen(80d),Cornito Rosso(80d), Cornito Giallo,yel.(75d), and Escamillo,org.(80d). But the earliest to ripen are the Lunchbox series(small tapered) and the Cute Stuff series, Cupid(red), and Eros(yel) minibells. Both Lunchbox peppers and minibells have been a great market success for me and from early July I've picked avg. of 3-4 peppers twice a week from almost every plant. Flavor is great and as an added benefit the Lunchbox peppers have only small amt. of seeds next to stem. One issue is that Lunchbox Red is 1/3 smaller than both Lunchbox Yellow or Lunchbox Orange.

Too many names to mention and that is just sweet peppers. By the way the Days to maturity numbers may vary as with any vegetable depending on many factors. Big Bertha is listed as a 70d large red bell but don't count on it.

Ace and Biscayne last year. So many red peppers. I was roasting these to can just because we had so many.

Probably too late to get good results from seed this year unfortunately.

Those looks tasty Peter. Both are good producers but Biscayne is a cubanelle type. Giant Italian Roaster is one variety that I halved and threw in my smoker and they are great mixed into any dish. They are like a bell pepper on steroids. Vidi, a variety I mentioned earlier, won me numerous blue ribbons at county fairs because they often are 10" long and they actually are early to ripen. Teseo de Toro, a red bullhorn, will be thick fleshed and up to 10" long too. They ripen about the same time as Carmen but flavor is not there.

Cool I will check those out. Our season here is kind of iffy and I have a good spot but there is some shade in the morning and evening so I need to stick with early varieties. I would be concerned a tunnel would block too much sun, and a high tunnel isn't really an option.

On the contrary, tunnels block very little sunlight. Even with 2 plastic layers the plants get plenty light.

it's the early heat that peppers love.

Yes well I don't have the room for anything like that. :)

I could do a low tunnel.

I use a low tunnel with Agribon not plastic to protect a late crop of bush beans from the early light frost we get mid-Sept. As long as you open plastic during the day, it should be fine. I'm getting 100 deg temps in my high tunnel (peaked roof style) with sides rolled up and front double door open in summer. This time of year it is easily in the 80s on a sunny day yet windy, high 40s outside, with it all closed up. I saw one design where the short, low tunnel hinged on one end to tip open during the day.

I find the sweet bullhorn peppers such as Carmen give me earlier and more sweet red peppers than bell types. The lunchbox types sound like ones I should try, also.

You are likely to have some peppers go bad during the extra time they are growing before they turn red...or another color if that is their genetics. Watch for spots, sunscald, or other damage and remove those while they are still usable with a little trimming while still in the green stage...or half way to full color. Once you grow sweet colored bells yourself, you'll understand the premium prices on the colored peppers at farm markets and grocery store.

i'll throw in another recommendation for the bulls horn types. They are early ripening, very prolific and the ripening is pretty constant compared to the ripening flushes with bell peppers and I don't get a glut of ripening at the end of the season that I have to find something to do with. Like barrie2m I am growing Carmen (red), Cornito Giallo (orange), Escamillo and Corno di Torro which are both yellow.

Jack, your Corno di Toro could very well bee yellow but I have Corno di Toro Red from Totally Tomatoes Seeds and they list that one as a red 72 day "Horn of the bull"(name translation in Italian) pepper. If you indeed have a yellow version I'd like to know the seed source if possible.

First year growing them as well as Escamillo so color TBD. I got the seeds from Reimer so based on their reputation who knows, but they do list this one as yellow. They do seem to be growing a little differently then the Carmen and Cornito Giallo. Much shorter and stockier.

Corno di Torro yellow

Just looking over a Harris seed catalog and noticed a few listed very early red bell pepper varieties that I have never tried but may be worth investigating. If any of you tried these please respond with thoughts: Karma(60d), New Ace(65d), Flamingo(66d). The Ace bell variety I have is listed as a 70d to red variety.

Jack, also noted that Johnny's lists Corno do Giallo as a yellow med. size horn, almost identical color as Escamillo.

Did you mean Cornito Giallo? I saw it listed as yellow at Johnny's too. I also got it at Reimers and they list it as Orange so who knows. I am partially color blind so I probably won't be able to tell the difference anyway :). The only reason I ordered from Reimers is because they had both Alibi and Little Leaf H19 pickling cukes that I wanted and I thru in the Peppers to get the order up to the maximum under the minimum shipping charge. I got the Escamillo and Carmen from Johnny's. Carmen I have grown for a couple years. I got 100% germination from all 4 types though so I can't give Reimers a negative review as yet.

Reimers - Cornito Giallo

Yes, Jack, Cornito Giallo. This auto-complete feature tried to mess up my typing again. You make a good point about errors that seed companies make. Most times I wonder how they come up with the flavor profiles. DTM numbers are all over the place when you compare different sources.

Carmen F1 for Italian peppers

Revolution F1 for bell peppers.

Both grow well and turn red in our short Canadian summer.

Both are hybrids though.

Ditto on the recommendations for Carmen, a friend has had good success with them for years.

Melrose is another good, short-season "frying pepper" that ripens quickly, and bears heavily. Thin walls, but very crisp & sweet. Melrose is highly productive, I literally picked buckets of these last year from 8 plants.

Elephant's Ear is a conical pepper with walls as thick as a bell, but ripens more reliably in my climate. They are 5-6 oz. in weight, dark green immature, and brilliant glossy red when ripe.

Sweet Chocolate is a pepper that is brown when ripe, and ripens quickly. The peppers are a little longer & thinner walled than most bells, but they have a huge yield, and tolerate cool weather.

For early red peppers with some heat, its hard to beat Beaver Dam. Large, thick-walled peppers borne abundantly on dwarf plants. This is my favorite pepper for canned salsa, because the peppers are heavy, and because they seldom fail.

Italian Cheese is another early, high-yielding pepper with a little zing. They look like pimento peppers, but have slightly thinner walls. I was very impressed with the yield.

As much as I love bells, they have just been too temperamental for me - like last year. I tried Orange Bell (for the 3rd time) and from 8 plants, had one pepper that did not rot. I grow a lot of Elephant's Ear & pimento peppers in place of bells, and have great luck with them.

another fan of cubanelle.. they have the best productivity, but it takes the whole season from early transplants to get red. i also love the crisp texture, flavor and production of cali wonder but i use them all green as they rarely ripen in iowa z5. Anaheim and Pimiento L are also good choices over bells in colder zones. Shishito or Padron will ripen too but takes full season.