i have had success getting early peppers in a hoophouse. the variety i used is ace. i had then at the market before anyone else. when other green peppers started showing up and killed the market i left them to turn red and then had the only colored peppers at the market for a while. generally i don't think of peppers as a big money maker.

The tunnel to the far right was my peppers and eggplant this year. It is rebar and tubing but could be EMT instead. The earliest varieties are Frank's, Lipstick, Odessa Market and the mini bells. I don't sell peppers well at market but the CSAs enjoy them. Eggplants and peppers get aphids if they get too hot under the cover.

I put sideways cages in the eggplant end of that bed for trellising them later.

Love that picture, little_minnie. I'm looking forward to summer already!
I second the recommendation for Ace. It is a top performer for me, even in my zone. I start in April and transplant into high tunnels in early June. I get the first green bells by mid-July, or late July if it's a cool summer. With row covers, I can extend production to 4-6 weeks after first frost. With Ace and my market prices, I estimate that I make $3 per square foot per season for pepper sales. The limitation is the size of the market.
I sell peppers at $4/lb, same as the other pepper vendor at my market.

This post was edited by Slimy_Okra on Sat, Nov 29, 14 at 19:55

We always try to transplant our peppers in the high tunnel, in black plastic around the 15-20th of April. We are usually picking bells around June 15ish. I also grow ACE, they are early, but they are also smaller. I also grow Revolution, Red Knight, Aristotle, Tequilla, Gourmet (an awesome orange variety), and Lafayette ( been discontinued).

Here are some pics from the last year, 2013.
This first one was taken on April 28th.

May 18th

May 26th

June 15th

Thanks everyone, for all the pics and suggestions.

Try smaller fruited sweet peppers like the Lunchbox series. They are weeks earlier and quite productive:

I was just having that very thought before you said it, looking at them in the Johnny's catalog right now.

Peppers are one of my most valuable crops every season. I find that if they're grown in the high tunnel they don't need black plastic and still produce much heavier and earlier than if planted outside.

I don't bother with any green peppers at all. The market is always saturated from Mexico and the price is just not worth it for the amount of time they take to grow. Red peppers however are a different story and sell like crazy in July when they start and continue producing all the way till frost. My price never dropped from $4/lb all season and I sold about 50 lbs. per market at the height of it.

I start seeds about Feb.1st and have plants dripping with red peppers by mid July.

Mark: Are those red peppers Carmen or a variety similar? I have tried and tried to grow sweet peppers, but they never sell (even if they are colored).

I know you have told me before, but I forget, what is your trellis material? I really like it. I will have to try that next year. Looks very simple to set up.

Green Bells are easy to sell, for me, if they are big. The colored ones end up being smaller, bargain price green or colored, 75 cents each or 3 for $2. I have tried to charge more and I ended up only selling the big ones. Lots of happy, repeat customers.

If color bells are of interest, try the purple or white ones. They start off purple or white then turn red. They will give you early color when everyone else still only has green.

Jay

One scheme which has been useful to me in our quite cool summers, and short season is to start the peppers with a quite healthy dose of nitrogen fertilizer, and start about three weeks earlier than usually recommended. What happens is that I get quite large transplants which delayed flowering for a couple weeks because of the strong vegetive growth earlier on. When the flowers come, they come in force, and I get a very heavy first fruit set. There are usually quite a few peppers on the plants when transplanted, and they ripen well, and earlier than I would otherwise get a crop. Note that my transplants for such a scheme are in about gallon pots, and they are very vigorous.
Renais

Or you can take an opposite approach and hold back on Nitrogen for an earlier fruit set. I like to pick peppers repeatedly and get multiple fruit sets. I believe that stressing plants actually stimulates more yield. This is especially evident in the sweet and hot banana types.

Jay,
You're right, that's "Carmen" in that photo and the trellis is Hortanova.

bmoser, some nice pics in your album, that's s very intensive greenhouse you have.

This turned out to be a great thread :)

Is everyone growing hybrid bells and not open pollinated? I have much better luck with hybrids. OP bells for me grow small and thin-walled.

What about the newest and typically super-expensive varieties of hybrid bells? I have seen some seed prices that are just astronomical. Some of them may be meant for greenhouse & hydroponic growing. I want to be able to grow a "grocery store" bell pepper. Early Sunsation has been my closest to meeting that goal.

Madroneb, I like your GH pictures as well but, although tempting, I'll not be growing peppers in greenhouse again, mainly b/c I agree with others that the price just does not justify the input. I had quite a few blue ribbon winners at our county fair so I know I have some of the earliest colored peppers regionally but I end up taking bushel orders in Sept/Oct in order to sell all I can pick.

There are adjustments that everyone can make to grow varieties for which there is greatest demand. My demand for the lunchbox sweet peppers is still growing but a few other types have been great sellers in our area. Pablano and Anaheim (some refer to as green chili) have been in good demand. I've also had good success with an early purple (red ripe) scotch bonnet pepper that is OP. It just looks terrific on the market table.
{{gwi:2128222}}

Yes Cole, My pepper production really started to sky rocket when I started to grow the most productive hybrids. OP peppers are nice and cheap, but how much does it cost you in lost production to grow them. I want to plant the most productive, highest yielding varieties in my high tunnels. The ground under those high tunnels is the most expensive I have.

If you look at your fixed costs of growing in the high tunnel, the tunnel, the irrigation, the plastic mulch, trellis material, soil amendments, etc. Those costs don't change if you plant the cheapest seed or a more productive seed. However, your yield can change. Cheap seed, less production. More expensive seed, More production. More Production=More Profit.

Now I know that just because a seed is expensive doesn't mean it is better. But the breeding behind that seed is what is important. My experience has showed me that you get what you pay for.

This post was edited by jrslick on Thu, Dec 4, 14 at 11:40

My customers don't seem wowed by lots of sweet pepper selection the way they are with tomatoes, so this season I stuck with just 3 varieties (Carmen, Pritavit, Gathers Gold). Two of these varieties are F1 hybrids and one is an OP. Surprisingly, I didn't see any difference in production between the varieties.

This is not in any way to negate what Jay said above, he's mostly right. I just want to offer something based on my experience working on a few organic seed farms.
I apologize for my long winded response.

Based on field trials I've participated in, the belief that F1 hybrids are ALWAYS more productive is not often the case. It takes years and years to select for the many factors that make a great pepper (taste, yield, disease resistance, etc) Being that there's more profit to be made by creating a privatized cultivar that's not easily reproduced (F1 hybrid), the large seed companies can afford to spend the production time it takes to come up with an awesome variety which they can make big bucks on (remember when that white eggplant was $1.50 per seed!).
It takes a very altruistic and dedicated seed farmer to put in years of selecting work and then just release their OP variety which anyone can reproduce. Frank Morton from Wild Garden Seeds spent years breeding Gathers Gold sweet pepper and helps to show that even on slow growing pepper plants, well bred OP's can rival the F1 competition. Jimmy Nardello's pepper is another good example.

I'm mostly saying this because I think it's important that we don't just write off all OP varieties in favor of hybrids and that breeders like Frank get our financial support whenever possible.

-Mark