Capsicum annuum var. glabriusculum. a. Branch of flowering and fruiting plant, b. Flower, back view. c. Flower, front view. d. Flower, longitudinally dissected, e. Floral diagram, f. Fruit. Drawn by Priscilla Fawcett. Correll and Correll 1982.

From Florida south into the tropics are herbs about 1.5 m (4.9 feet) tall that have small, inconspicuous, white flowers. Fruits smaller than the end of your little finger follow and then turn red when ripe. Birds love these little fruits and greedily defend the area where the bushes grow. Humans, too, love the fruits and compete with the birds for the harvest. This competition has been going on since there were humans and birds in the Americas. English-speaking people usually call the fruits bird peppers (Florida to Belize). Several others associate them with birds in their common names, including some that are simple translations, and others that give different ideas. For example, Haitians say piment z’oiseaux [piment zouézeau, piment zouézo] (bird pepper), while it is ají pajarito (little bird pepper) to Colombians, and the Huastec of Mexico say the same with ts’itsin its. However, the Huastec have noticed another aspect of this bird/plant association and also call them taa’ ts’itsin (bird excrement). Birds do “plant” peppers regularly.