In January, I planted several serranos, chile de aguas, and a couple poblanos in pots in my garage. It has skylights and gets a few hours of sunshine a day. I finally have a place to transplant them with adequate sunshine. None of the plants are over 20" tall yet. They're all in potting soil from a hardware store.

After a couple months growth, the leaves of the chile de agua plants began to turn slightly yellowish in color and the leaves were droopy as if they were needing water. They soon grew limp and fell over. I propped them up with twigs and they continue to grow and put out leaves, but they still look stressed.

The serranos and poblano plants look normal, but they seem feeble and one fell over yesterday. Once propped up, they continue to grow.

A couple weeks ago, I set the chile de agua plant outside where it gets more sun, but not total sun. It's still feeble, but is hanging in there.

Temperatures have been mid 70's to mid 80's consistently since I planted them. I live in Costa Rica.

I've notice little fruit fly/knat type insects around the plants. I wonder if they are sucking life out of them.

What does the ob think my plants are suffering from besides a novice chile grower?

thanks in advance!

Pots stink like root rot?

That's #1 way I would lose plants when I managed a teaching greenhouse. Staying wet too long in pots.

I don't smell anything. The pots have the ability to drain. Lately, I've been watering them once the soil is getting dry down to about an inch. Mrs. Lebetter was wondering if the soil ph was unfavorable for the plants.

Take a soil sample 8" deep and get it run for nutrients, pH, salinity… also not sure what the fungal pathogens or nematodes might look like around there.

Guanacaste? Or farther south?

And can you get a picture of the bugs?

Wrong thread

We're in San Jose. Mrs. Ledbetter suggested testing the soil, but we haven't found any way to test it yet. The local Home Depot type stores with a gardening center don't carry anything to test with. She suggested a bit of vinegar around the base of one chile de agua plant as a test and it promptly died. I'll get some photos soon.

Almost seems like my potted chilies like it on the drier side, so I water only occasionally