You’ve probably gotten the sticker shock of your life these past few weeks from the P1,000 per-kilo price of bird’s eye chili peppers or siling labuyo, due to the recent inflation and rising costs of basic goods.
But did you know that it’s quite easy to grow sili on your own, even in a container garden of pot?
In this video from agribusiness.ph, Rudy Dean of the Allied Botanical Corporation explains how to grow it:
1. Use bird’s eye chili pepper seeds purchased at a garden store or supermarket. Or you can dry your own.
2. Place one seed per hole in a seedling tray with potting mix, water.
3. After 18 to 21 days, transfer to your garden plot or container. Add 100g of organic fertilizer or vermicompost.
4. Water every three days, only.
5. After 20 days, fertilize with urea and complete fertilizer to encourage growth of more branches.
6. Forty (40) days after transplanting, add complete fertilizer with potassium; this is to ensure that the fruit will be bigger and more plentiful.
7. After 75 days (from initial planting), your plant will bear its ripened sili fruit.
According to Rudy, one kilo of sili is composed of approximately 200 pieces of peppers—that’s your P1,000 right there!
If you’re still too lazy to do all of this, then go online and buy a MNL Hot Pepper Growkit for only P180. It comes with seeds, potting mix, a biodegradable husk pot, and instructions (above), all for less than the cost of a handful of siling labuyo at the supermarket!
SOURCE: agribusiness.ph
This story originally appeared on RealLiving.com.ph.
* Minor edits have been made by the PEP.ph editors.