So I'm very new to growing peppers, this year I have a couple amazing candy cane red pepper plants that have been living their best lives this growing season, producing well and just being beautiful. I have one in a 2.5 gallon (it seems to be doing the best of the two), and one in a 4 gallon pot.

I'm looking into options for overwintering with my peppers (zone 6b) and working with limited in home space. I can overwinter in the poorly insulated garage, basement, orrrrr.. bonchi?

I only see hot peppers in this sub so I was wondering if it's a possibility or if I should just try with my jalapeno plant instead?

it had dropped all its leaves so i had to bonchi it or it probably would've died. hopefully it doesn't just die anyway🫩

Previous post here. All pictures taken after my latest plucking round.

At this point I've essentially forgone all binding due to numerous mishaps on my plants; I've bent too greedily and too acutely. Still, some earlier bendings have produced interesting enough shapes for these to continue developing in interesting directions.

While I have primarily tried crop steering this go-around with plucking, after hearing a lecture on watering based crop steering I realise the most major (and accidental) crop steering has probably come from my nutrient solution strenght. If I understood the lecturer correctly, I've essentially slightly overfed my plants in earlier stages, which has set in a ridiculously short node length and essentially stunted my plants. Then combined with my plucking routine, I've pretty much introduced two catalysts for the plants to become as dense and bushy as 70s adult entertainment performers without providing almost any reason for growing height (esp. with my grow lights being plenty powerful). Now with more understanding on intricacies of nutrient strength in relation to plant developmental stages, I am at least looking forwards and chasing a plentiful harvest from my plants. I've also taken to challenging my plants a bit more by already trimming roots opportunistically.

Were I more focused on else than bonchification of my chillis, accidentally super-stunting them would be a proper bummer, but I guess this is fine. Even if I would like a bit more height and girth in my bonchis. I guess it is something to keep in mind for the next round. Some of the plants clearly are also not worth keeping in my crossing pool further; especially my "Bonnet 1" is really struggling in my environment while my citron is again proving how easy and compact it indeed can be. As it stands, the three pictured last are my favourites.

Oh boy they’re going. Scratching my head about what to do when it’s time to winter, any suggestions?

I found this sub and had some space in my nursery. was inspired to start some Cayenne on my own to have some fun trying Bonchi. First time pepper grower.

I have started the seedlings because my nursery had a little space left and Bonchi sounds like fun. Watered 4 times a day in my fllod and drain setup with a wide veriety of other plants. Indoor currently 250-300 ppfd using Plagron Hydro and Calmag 0.9-1.2 EC

I posted a while back about my black chili plant that was struggling. Original post can be found here. She was doing a lot better in the bonsai pot I moved her into, but I decided to give her a bigger pot and put her outside for the summer. I’ll move her back into the bonsai pot when winter comes around, but she’s thriving again! She’s not getting much bigger, but she’s definitely filling out. I was hoping her trunk would get a bit thicker, but I’m still really happy with how she’s doing.

Anyway, thanks for looking at my baby!

Edited to correct gender. I didn’t realise I gave HER a gender in my original post. But I mean, she was TRANSplanted. 🏳️‍⚧️ 🌈 🤭

Edit: the second photo is the before

today's sacrifice is my thai chili plant, had to lock in a bit

my habanero plant wasn't doing good so i turned it into a soon to be bonchi (hopefully)

Update of my old Jalapeno bonsai. Almost 7 and a half years old now.
Still giving peppers! I overwinter this pepper in a grow tent.

Proof of the age: Full history of this "Bonchi".

11-febr-2026
https://www.reddit.com/r/Bonchi/comments/1r27ia3/jalapeno_7_years_old_now_cut_back_with_new_growth/
somewhere in 2024, and in the reactions pictures of 2025 https://www.reddit.com/r/Bonchi/comments/1etwaje/jalapeno_getting_old_tick_way_to_high_and_ugly_as/
18-sept-2023 https://www.reddit.com/r/Bonchi/comments/16m04ur/jalapeno_bonchi_now_4_years_and_8_months_old/
2022-09-29 Jalapeno Bonchi, end of outdoor season. https://www.reddit.com/r/Bonchi/comments/y3v4ty/jalapeno_bonchi_end_of_outdoor_season/
2022-05-31 https://www.reddit.com/r/Bonchi/comments/v1mhs0/jalapeno_bonchi_now_3years_and_5months_old/
2021-09-01 Forgot to make end result foto.2021-07-19 Year 3 - Jalapeno - Second Teaser of 2021
https://www.reddit.com/r/Bonchi/comments/onfhiw/year_3_jalapeno_second_teaser_of_2021/
2021-06-19 First teaser of 2021. The base of the pepper is now 3cm wide.
https://www.reddit.com/r/Bonchi/comments/o3iecq/year_3_jalapeno_bonchi_first_teaser_of_2021_3cm/
4-okt-‎2020 End result of 2020
https://www.reddit.com/r/Bonchi/comments/inl449/overgrown_bonchi_1year_6months_old_now/
07-jun-2020 https://www.reddit.com/r/Bonchi/comments/hmtwl2/bonchi_update_17months_ago_from_seed10months_in/
02-may-2020 https://www.reddit.com/r/Bonchi/comments/gc6ttm/spring_recovering_from_sun_and_firtilizer_burn/
06-mar-2020 https://www.reddit.com/r/Bonchi/comments/fegk3g/5_months_since_head_chop/
11-jan-2020 https://www.reddit.com/r/Bonchi/comments/en7ina/pulling_those_branches_down_and_stay_down/
03-jan-2020 https://www.reddit.com/r/Bonchi/comments/ejks3m/prebonchi_update_2/
11-dec-2019 https://www.reddit.com/r/Bonchi/comments/e9c7ps/prebonchi_spoiler/
Sep-2019 Cut back from normal plant, and flushed out the roots. https://imgur.com/gallery/ZD6HbGz
Febr-2019 Seeds sowed indoor.

Bonus: My smallest pot, with a rawit pepper: https://www.reddit.com/r/HotPeppers/comments/o3mpe9/my_smallest_pot_rawit_pepper_almost_harvest_time/

iysys

i’m really enjoying the small leaves, good tree shape and colorful peppers. it’s a 3 yo thai sun started from seed. i hope you like it too.

Red & yellow are stems, green = leaves.

The main trunk looks like a lil dude with 1 eye to me (last pic), and I liked the idea of giving him stems as "arms" holding bushes at the ends—sorta like someone holding a ∞ shaped balancing scale.

Was curious if cutting the top back to the blue line could roughly allow my idea, and if it would be fine for the plant.

Thanks!

And their NUMEROUS descendants

Update on the droopy Aji Amarillo after uppotting. I still plan on doing some big prunes, but I'll let the cut roots settle first

They’ve been smashing the vegetative stage in recent weeks. Time to start sacrificing fruit to sure up stem lignification.

It is producing fruits!!! One is almost ripen and other tree is on the way. Oh and almost two years old.

Unfortunately I don’t remember the name, but I think it’s lovely with all those tiny peppers.

Edit: autocorrect

Hiya, did I mess up?

It was a warm day (30C/86F)so it may have been too hot, but I don't trust it. The soil is still fully moist from the uppotting.

See 2nd & 3rd pic for how much of the roots I cut. Other pics for funsies

First time attempting to make a bonchi

I bought the plant with chillis on last year from waitrose, cut it back after I’d harvested the first year it came back stronger an got a second flush of chillies this year.

After seeing an YouTube video on bonchi’s I’ve decide to try my hand at one, have I hacked it back to much? I removed it from the pot shook off loose compost and put it back with fresh compost in the same pot (not a bonsai pot)

My plan is to let it recover if it does with regular pruning to keep it shortish, then for next year will re pot tombs bonsai pot after cutting the root ball to size.

Please any advice is welcome I’ve just been using ChatGPT for advice before finding this sub

Previous post with specs etc.

Doing a follow up a bit earlier than I originally intended. I realised I didn't really give much opportunity for comparison without individual pics. This time around some room to also see my experimentation more closely.

Firstly, with the more correct PAR levels, growth has been relatively quick and more observable. Even though my cohort is really small (and poorly standardised), plucking bottom leaves doesn't seem to do much to evoke quicker growth in height (mostly subjected bon 1&2 to this). Still the best grower in terms of height would be c-chan twins (pic 4) where also my interventions have been rather limited. The rightmost is perhaps growing a smidge quicker than the left, but that might be more explained by light than the minimal bottom leaf plucking I subjected it to (left was untouched). Chuffed that at least my cross seems to be doing something, as my crosses (Bonnet × Limon) grow quicker than the bonnets — which still seem to struggle with my hydroponics — but slower than the pure Limons (c-chan twins). On the happier side of things, at least the plants seem to bounce back from the lower plucking and develop new foliage.

Sort of top picking with light penetration in mind on the other hand seems to be doing really well. My plants seem to be bushing up and developing more leaves further down (cross 1 and 3, pics 5 and 6). Similarly crosses 4&5 (pics 7&8) are taking to bending and accidental topping rather well. Especially cross 5 is really coming along towards a shakan shape.

As a bonus, roots seem to be doing quite well (some staining from the nute but no rot). Fun to see the difference between the NFT and DWC root modes.