What is this one? Located in Costa Rica and growing in the divider between a street and the sidewalk. The little chiles look like pequines, but I don't remember chile pequine plants having a woody shrub like trunk. It's about six feet tall. I wondered if the chiles are still growing and will get longer.

No expert, but that looks a lot like chile pequin to me.

I agree. The woody trunk has me wondering if its something else.

In going with pequin. I grow them and have several thst come back perennially. The stick gets pretty woody by end of season. I would imagine with no freeze concerns it only gets more stout.

Thanks. Good to know. I'll be harvesting them very soon. I need some seed stock so I can grow my own. I've got serranos, chile de aguas and poblano growing now, but I've been plagued with lack of direct sunlight as I don't have a yard. I just transplanted them in some garden space I located and they're growing and flowering, but slowly. We're in the rainy season now and cloudy half the day.

My plant for reference.

You're loaded with pequines!

Ugh. So jealous. Mine all died and I actually bought a plant that turned out to be mislabeled. I had tons last year.

Well. I'm happy to share. If you're in ETX, just come by and pick some.

I love this plant. My dad has been cultivating them for years, and each time I have moved he's cut me plant to grow. This one took 3 years to really blossom. Last year I could pick 5-10 a night but this year… so can't even keep up.

I've noticed a few wild ones growing around my other trees and bushes. I'm hoping many birds plant me some via digestive fertilizing. I'd take s landscape fill of them over Indian hawthornes and other green bushes.

marcel ledbetter said:

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I agree. The woody trunk has me wondering if its something else.

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My chiltepin plant gets woody.

Looking at the pictures I wouldn't rule out something in the Capsicum frutescens species. Can you post a picture of the flower?

Both of those plants look like chiltepin to me as opposed to pequins. Pequins being the more oval of the two I believe. Seems to always be some confusion around which is which. Growing up in South Texas I feel like both were called chile de monte.

I'll try and get some pics next week.

fishag04 said:

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Both of those plants look like chiltepin to me as opposed to pequins. Pequins being the more oval of the two I believe. Seems to always be some confusion around which is which. Growing up in South Texas I feel like both were called chile de monte.

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While i agree with yout description, the problem is that Pequin and Tepin are both as much colloquial descriptors as they are varietal descriptors. Both would be Capsicum annuum var. glabriusculum. What complicates things even more is that all wild species tend to all have small round red fruit.

How do those two varieties compare as far as flavor and heat. Pequines have a great flavor and their size sort of keeps you from over indulging in them.

They should be pretty similar as far as taste.

As far as heat goes a lot of the wild species will somewhere around in the 50k Scoville range, some hotter some not.

The thing about your pictures is that the calyx looks like a tabasco pepper while the shape doesn't match. Looking at the # of flowers per node it also looks like a frutescens but given the location it could be one of many wild species that are hard to distinguish between.

I just popped a couple of them with some burrito mix I made for supper. They have that same flavor of pequines, but much milder. I believe its due to the plant being exposed to the massive rains they get down here. Chile plants that are over watered tend to have milder flavored chiles. Rainfall is no joke down here and I really like it. Almost every tree is fruit bearing and they plant mango trees in all the parks, sidewalks, yards, etc. Fresh fruit is amazing down here! That said, it's hard to find good chiles, and tomatillos are almost non existent. Fresh fruit and vegetables spoil much faster than back in America, also.

Mine is 3-4 yo plant and has a woody base.