I am getting a little to serious about peppers

[Cajun Smokes]

A few of the pepper plants have got large enough to move to larger pots. It was also time to stop using a sharpie with a number to keep track of the plants.

I had replaced the computer in the garage a while ago for the CNC, Laser cutter and other stuff but got a little lazy about adding all the programs into it and getting it working.

I spent some time yesterday getting my laser cutter/engraver working again. Once I got it working I made a simple template with pop cycle sticks to make labels for the peppers.

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They worked out pretty well but I learned fast how the darker colors burn through the plastic faster than the lighter colors. An easy adjustment.

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I also added a fan to this ongoing grow.

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This seems to working great for you. Happy harvest in the horizon

 

[nlife]

It's been a few years since I grown peppers. I went all in and at one point I had 75 or so different varieties. Everything from mild to wild. I eventually settled on simply growing Bhut Jolokia and Ministry of Agriculture Scotch Bonnets since those are the ones we use the most often and enjoy the most.

I quickly found out that my colder northern climate and short growing seasons required different techniques to accommodate the long grow times of Jolokias and bonnets. I believe the Jolokia's are around 160 days to harvest. The Bonnets are in the 110ish days or so.

I'm still using some of the jolokia's I grew in 2016 and dried after we had record highs for temps. What a bumper crop that was. I have a few 1g bags of bonnets in the fridge for when we do jerk pork or chicken. I simply love the flavor of these compared to Habs.

It looks like you're off to a good start.

 

[netspyder]

I also bought a few more varieties.

Wiri Wiri Yellow
Black Pearl
Italian Jimmy Nardello
Wiri Wiri Red (from the dried peppers I bought)
Fresno

i've had mixed results with black pearl - one year they were great and so hot they made my mouth numb but the next year they had no heat whatsoever. had to order them from different places, so that was probably it.

 

[Chris_in_SoCal]

It has been a while since I have updated this thread. There have been bad and good things since the last update.

The bad was I had an infestation of aphids on the larger plants. The treatment I used was too hard and almost killed the larger ones and took out most of the seedlings I had transplanted into pots.

Lesson learned and moving on. My lights only have the option for 4, 8 or 12 hours. From what I have read I should need more so I added the original light strip that was lost in shipping for a while. It turns on an hour before the main lights and off soon after. It turns on again before the main lights go off and stays on for another hour. This gives more hours of light with a ramp up and down on the amount of light.

I took one of the seed beds and tried what I have learned online. I replaced the soil with vermiculite and placed in it the seeds that did not sprout with soil. I kept it well watered from the bottom and sprayed a mixture of 1 part black tea with 5 parts water on them daily.

In 7 days I have 7 sprouts from the stubborn seeds. To me this is a win. I hope to have more soon.

Here are a couple pics of the sprouts of various peppers doing good and growing until I re-plant them in the spring.

The larger ones in the background are starting new leaves so they are not dead.

 

[Fueling Around]

Looking good.
Be a few months before I start my pepper sprouting.
I'm growing a solo tomato plant this winter.

What did you use on the aphids? For indoor, I just use insecticidal soap and let the plants dry well

Some seeds are a pain to sprout in a greenhouse. I've had my best luck with the week or so in a damp paper towel

 

[Chris_in_SoCal]

What did you use on the aphids? For indoor, I just use insecticidal soap and let the plants dry well

I used an outdoor one that was way too strong. I diluted it but not enough.

The Vermiculite is working great. One day later and now 11 sprouts are popping up thru it.

 

[nlife]

Were the big plants brought in from outside to overwinter?

 

[Chris_in_SoCal]

Were the big plants brought in from outside to overwinter?

Yes, two were brought inside for that. The other two were delivered in November so I placed them straight in there.

 

[nlife]

There's your aphid problem. I've tried to overwinter a few plants when I first started growing. Everything was going great until about December/November. Next thing you know I had an aphid explosion. Now I cull at the end of the season and start over again come January/February because of that.

I used pesticides to try and take care of the problem back then, but I could never get them all. Eventually I came to the conclusion that there really wasn't much better than ladybugs/ladybirds (whatever you call them locally). Especially if you can get them to lay eggs. The larva just crawl all over the plant looking for aphids.

 

[broozer]

I grow a habanero plant every year on our South-facing deck; they love it there. After harvest, I dry them in an old Ronco food dehydrator, then grind them in a spice grinder and put them in a shaker bottle. That way I can add the heat to anything I want.

 

[02ebz06]

I've done that with Hatch Chilies. Handy for adding a little heat.

 

[nlife]

That's basically what I did with the Jolokia's I grew back in 2016. I dried enough to fill a 1g ziploc bag full and then some. We found out the hard way that you need to let the dust settle in the bean grinder after giving the chilies a buzz. Pretty easy to pepper spray yourself if you don't.

 

[Chris_in_SoCal]

That is what got me started on wanting to grow more exotic types of peppers. I sun dried out various peppers (Thai, Red and green jalapeno, habinaro and sweet peppers.

I bought a cheap coffee grinder just for peppers. This made a great rub.

 

[broozer]

That's basically what I did with the Jolokia's I grew back in 2016. I dried enough to fill a 1g ziploc bag full and then some. We found out the hard way that you need to let the dust settle in the bean grinder after giving the chilies a buzz. Pretty easy to pepper spray yourself if you don't.

Ha! Been there, done that.

 

[Chris_in_SoCal]

The babies are growing up. I will have a lot of varieties to get going outside in about a month.

I am glad I started early. Some are growing faster than others.

I also now have a gnat problem. The sticky pads are working on it though. These were placed on the wall 24 hours ago.

 

[02ebz06]

Looks like a lot of gnats.

 

[nlife]

I am glad I started early. Some are growing faster than others.

I also now have a gnat problem. The sticky pads are working on it though. These were placed on the wall 24 hours ago.

Generally speaking, the hotter the pepper, the slower it grows. Peppers like the jalapeno have a much shorter 'days to harvest' (DTH) time than super hots like the Jolokia and Carolina reapers.

For example, if you're planning on growing both Jolokia's (160 DTH) and Jalapeno's (80 DTH), you'd want to stagger your sowing dates so you don't end up having one incredibly tall plant and one really short one.

It isn't too much of an issue for one or more plants to be taller than the rest if you have the room. If you're plants are all on the same shelf, you'll have to move the lights up to accommodate the faster growing ones. When you do this, the shorter plants aren't getting as much light and tend to get really tall and leggy as they grow towards adequate light.

Moving them closer to the light will help and you can always bury them deeper when you transplant them to the next pot size.

In terms of the gnats, those likely came in with your potting soil. Lots of people will nuke their soil for a bit in the microwave to help take care of them prior to putting plants in it.

What does your light schedule look like at the moment?

 

[Chris_in_SoCal]

What does your light schedule look like at the moment?

The main lights run for 12 hours. The light strip comes on one hour before that and turns off 1/2 hour after the main lights are on. It turns on again 1/2 hour before the main lights turn off and off 1 hour later. It is a total of 14 hours per day.

 

[nlife]

The main lights run for 12 hours. The light strip comes on one hour before that and turns off 1/2 hour after the main lights are on. It turns on again 1/2 hour before the main lights turn off and off 1 hour later. It is a total of 14 hours per day.

I would suggest you up the light schedule to 24/7. Research out of the New Mexico Chili Institute found that chili plants thrive under 24/7 light for the first 5-7 weeks after sprouting. Essentially this amounts to an extra 10 hours of light per day in your situation. Much past the first 5-7 weeks of light and the plants were found to suffer from leaf necrosis.

After that, I'd suggest an 18/6 light schedule since chili plants don't really follow the same light schedule as other cash crops.

The extra light in the beginning will help ensure the plant is bigger when when you move them outdoors and ultimately a bigger yield at the end of the year.

 

[Chris_in_SoCal]

I would suggest you up the light schedule to 24/7. Research out of the New Mexico Chili Institute found that chili plants thrive under 24/7 light for the first 5-7 weeks after sprouting. Essentially this amounts to an extra 10 hours of light per day in your situation. Much past the first 5-7 weeks of light and the plants were found to suffer from leaf necrosis.

After that, I'd suggest an 18/6 light schedule since chili plants don't really follow the same light schedule as other cash crops.

The extra light in the beginning will help ensure the plant is bigger when when you move them outdoors and ultimately a bigger yield at the end of the year.

Thank you, I will check that out. Seems unnatural though.