Pepper newbie wants to know - where's the productivity?

[cleo88]

Hi,
I know a fair amount about growing tomatoes from seed, but I am evidently no whiz at peppers.... help....

I grew four pepper plants from seed this spring: Corno Di Torro Yellow, Marconi Red and two Quadrati d'Asti Rosso. They are about 2 1/2 feet tall now, a little bug-eaten in the leaf department but otherwise looking fine.

But they just are really not productive. The Marconi has one big pepper on it and that's it, and the one of the Quadratis finally (in mid August) have a couple of marble-sized peppers. That just seems so chintzy - I have tomatoes coming out of my ears. They've had a bunch of white flowers that have not pollinated. What am I doing wrong?

Thoughts:

Not watering enough thus stressing them out? - I water sparingly because my tomatoes like it that way

They need more sunlight - somehow the tomatoes do fine with their five hours that ends mid afternoon, but peppers want more? Or the tomatoes are blocking some of the sunlight since they are taller?

It needs to be really hot for pollination to happen, hotter than tomatoes like it? Hence some are pollinating now but only one happened before August.

Different soil requirements than tomatoes? Or the tomatoes are stealing all the soil nutrients?

Please advise!