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Bell peppers are one of the most popular vegetables grown in home gardens. Peppers are a tender, warm-season crop. They resist most pests and offer something for everyone: spicy, sweet or hot, and a variety of colors, shapes and sizes. Planting and care • Sowing is done all year around. • The temperature must be at least 70 degrees F for seed germination, so keep them in a warm area for the best and fastest results. • Start pepper seeds three to a pot, and thin out the weakest seedling. Let the remaining two pepper plants spend their entire lives together as one plant. • The leaves of two plants help protect peppers against sunscald, and the yield is often twice as good as two segregated plants. Begin to harden off plants about 10 days before transplanting. A week before transplanting, introduce fertilizer or aged compost in your garden soil. • After the danger of frost has passed, transplant seedlings outdoors, 18 to 24 inches apart (but keep paired plants close to touching.) • Soil should be at least 65 degrees F, peppers will not survive transplanting at temps any colder. Northern gardeners can warm up the soil by covering it with black plastic. • Put two or three match sticks in the hole with each plant, along with about a teaspoon of fertilizer. They give the plants a bit of sulfur, which they like. Harvesting Capsicum will be ready for harvest about 2 months from planting. Capsicum of hybrid varieties start green and then mature to the their original color. Unlike the Hybrid varieties, the colour of the heirloom Capsicums results from their genetics, and not just the stage of ripeness.