When the chili peppers are thirty centimeters high, pinch the tops off with your fingers. That should get new branches to grow. When the first flowers show, give the plants some potash fertilizer. When the weather is warm, put them into five-liter pots and place them outside. Make sure they get a good amount of light and water.

Some people like mild chilies, others like plenty of heat. Some like to harvest the plants when the chilies are green. Others like their chilies red. Either way can give color and taste to many different foods.

And that's the VOA Special English Agriculture Report, written by Jerilyn Watson. You can find more gardening advice and share your own stories from the garden at voaspecialenglish.com. You can download transcripts and MP3s of all of our programs. You can also find captioned videos of Special English reports at the VOA Learning English channel on YouTube. I’m Steve Ember.