240 MISCELLANEOUS WARM PLANTS. 
price), the grower ought to be able to make his ex- 
penses; and if he secures more, as he often can, the 
growing of them should be fairly remunerative; but he 
will likely find that the peppers which are shipped in 
from the south nearly all winter are most unwelcome 
competitors in the general market. A plant should bear 
half a dozen good fruits, which it can do if well grown 
and if the fruits are picked just as soon as they are 
fit for market. 
In winter, about three and a half months are required 
from the seed to the first saleable fruit, but the plants 
need not be on the 
benches more than half 
or two-thirds of that 
time. They are usually 
started in flats, pricked 
» off into 3-inch pots and 
turned out of these pots 
(when in the condition 
shown in Fig. 86) di- 
rectly into the bench. 
In one of our experi- 
ments, seeds of the Sweet 
Mountain were sown July 
20, plants put into pots 
August 28, set in the 
386. Pepper plant ready to transplant. bench September 14, and 
gave the first picking 
(one fruit to the plant) on October 21. They require 
a longer time than this later in the season. A bench 
3 feet wide will grow two rows of peppers, the plants 
standing a foot apart in the row. Earlier results can 
be secured by growing the plants in 6-inch pots, but the 
crop will generally be less and the fruits smaller. We 
think that peppers like an intermediate temperature, — 
a little cooler than for melons, —although we have had 
good results in growing them along the edge of a bench 
