Photographs of this planting through the 2026 season, oldest first.
The photographs
Week of 22 JuneA Santa Fe Grande pepper on 26 June, a dozen buds swelling on curved stalks with three broken open into cream bells, and one pale cone of a fruit already set below them still wearing its withered flower, the whole plant lax and rain-wet.Week of 29 JuneA Santa Fe Grande pepper on 29 June, the purple-black staining at every node and fork the loudest color in the frame, one small fruit standing erect with the dried style still on its tip and a bud nodding below it in hard morning sun.Week of 6 JulySanta Fe Grande peppers on 9 July, three or four pendant cones hanging in under the lower leaves on short thick stalks, each smooth and waxy and still wholly pale yellow-green — the leaves above them lit through by low sun and flecked over with kaolin.Week of 6 JulyA Santa Fe Grande pepper on 9 July shot into the low sun so the upper leaves glow through and the base sits in shade — one creamy flower hanging pendant at mid height with its petals barely parted, and sunlit mown grass sweeping away behind it.Week of 6 JulySanta Fe Grande peppers on 12 July, five or six creamy yellow-green cones hung nose-down from stalks that arch over in a shepherd's crook, warming toward the tip, whitened with kaolin clay under harsh overhead sun that leaves almost no shadow.Week of 13 JulySanta Fe Grande peppers on 17 July, four butter-yellow cones squared off broad at the shoulder and narrowing to a blunt end, each calyx pressed flat on top with its lobes flaring out, streaked with kaolin and faintly damp in soft even light.Week of 20 JulySanta Fe Grande peppers on 20 July, three or four butter-yellow cones greening slightly at the shoulder with one faint crease down the near side, in hard direct midday sun that cuts the frame into bright highlight and deep shadow.Week of 20 JulyFour Santa Fe Grande peppers on 21 July, waxy translucent butter-cream and hanging tip-down off stalks hooked over like crooks, every one beaded from rain — and one small long-legged gnat sitting out on the face of the nearest fruit.Week of 24 AugustA Santa Fe Grande on 25 August caught exactly mid-turn — waxy yellow-green over the shoulder, then a band of olive, then clear apricot-orange running the whole lower edge out to the tip — its smooth skin finely beaded all over with water.
