I planted out my peppers today, and noticed something interesting as I inspected the root balls on each plant. IâÂÂve had many plants be severely root bound due to both space issues and because of lack of suitable pots (and the price of new ones). However, I have potted up several of them, many weeks ago. I noticed that some of the plants in 2l pots were still practically root bound in the old 0.5l pot shape. The added medium just stayed in the pot when I removed the plant - dead weight.

I have roughed up the root balls a little when potting up, but this tells me that you have to be quite determined when doing this to avoid the plant basically staying stunted, even when potted up. This explains why some of my plants have been suspiciously small for the past couple of weeks.

I also noticed that some plants had even developed a new root ball outside the root bound 0.5l shaped one, but the old one was more or less separated from the new one. I wonder how much energy the plant wasted on that project.

Needless to say, I have learned quite a lesson on potting up today. I also used this information and made sure I loosened up the root balls on all the plants as they went into the garden.

Anyone else experience this?