Prune it and repot it.

willardb3, thank you, I know that, but as my original post indicated (if you had read it), I need a little more guidance on what size pot and how exactly to prune it. I've never done a bonchi before.

look up bonchi on u-tube ... it's easy and you overwinter it, and it SHOULD go to town next season. Use a much smaller, shallow container and clean off the roots, trim the branches when u repot. de-bugify before you bring it in ..

You can prune it pretty much any way you want and pot size will be determined by how you prune it.

This is a sivuli with its roots and top pruned.

What kind of soil mix it is in now? If it is water retentive (it looks like it) then you should consider either downsizing the pot or add a ballast in the bottom of the pot to reduce water retained. This is not the best time to do a full bare root repot. In your area you may get away with it. Your plant looks weak and I would not prune it at all. You need to focus on getting it back in health. If it were mine I would get it into a 511 or gritty mix or anything similar that does not retain too much water. With these mixes pot size does not matter much. In winter they will like to be on dry side and proper bonsai like mix makes it much easier to achieve that.

Mine is in a gritty mix. I top prune it (like a hedge prune) when I bring it inside the house but I never prune it entirely. Indoors I keep it under lights. It will start losing some leaves but by March it will start growing back up again. Mine is on its 4th year.

This year I acquired another pepper - I think it is called Black pearl. Hope to keep it alive through the winter. It is already in bonsai mix.

Please pay extra close attention to what ToC said. He was spot on.

Al

It may be easier/cheaper for you to find ingredients for 511 mix and it will be easier in your kind of weather to keep the soil moist longer. The easiest way to improve drainage is to bury the pot in the ground making sure the native soil is in good contact with the drainage holes. An added advantage is that pot remains cool. You will be surprised with how fast the plant will grow.

Fat chance of the pot remaining cool in our climate. I pulled it out of its pot and found that it had very few roots left, so I just put it into a 1-gallon, trimmed it, and we'll see what happens. I put it into regular potting mix with extra perlite, because I just don't have the $$ to get special mix right now. Like I said, this is our growing season, so it should be o.k. I have it inside recovering from the repotting right now, but even at that, it's 81F in here all the time because I can't afford to keep the air conditioning any lower. It will either live or die. I'm not going to worry over it. It's just a pepper, and I have plenty of pepper seeds.