Bhut Jolokia hydroponic Grow Log

S.S.Tupperware · Nov 16, 2011

Lookin goot, I just gave my DWC Datil to the hydro store guy. They grow like crazy in there, and it got too big for my grow space, and i needed the room for my challenge peppers. I cloned my red bhut just for kicks, and hydro guy is now the proud owner of them both, you shouldn't have a problem.

aspore · Nov 16, 2011

I've been growing.....stuff .....for years now. But I figured I would go legal for once and try my hand at peppers. My friend at the hydro store gave me these seeds, I gave him back a nice Ghost in soil I did for him. It's on display at our store now and looks great, but this hydro setup has grown 6 times faster than soil. I have just this one in hydro, because I have hardly 0 space to grow. Looking for a new house soon and area to really expand my project. Hopefully by next spring I will be able to get 4 or 5 different varietys going in hopes to try my hand at cross breeding. I used to grow mushrooms, and I know of good techniques to keep all pollen inside a grow chamber, but also available to collect and store the pollen for future use at breeding. It's just a passionate hobby of mine.

JesterJoker · Nov 16, 2011

I'm messaging you now, I have so many question on the drip setup and the pump used.

I'm growing in some DWC buckets now with you 3 gallons of water with a few pepper monsters now.

What PPM and pH are you running at?

Spuds · Nov 16, 2011

That's awesome man. :woohoo:

aspore · Nov 16, 2011

Running Hydroponix Nutes (light does) with some homemade compost tea. (kelp, guano, beneficial fungi/bacterium)

Its a small pump, but it's dripping for 1 hour every 3 hours.

It drips from base of stem, down through hydraton, and drains into a DWC-ish setup. Airstone in the bottom.

PPM is @ 1000 right now.

lights are 16 on 8 off.

I have a lot of modifications I wish to make in the future, but I'm really running on a tight budget and low space at the moment. I'm just happy to be growing something. I'll hopefully have a new house soon and some extra cash to get the setup like I really want.

aspore · Nov 16, 2011

Youtube Channel

here is my youtube channel. video updates and such.

JesterJoker · Nov 16, 2011

bookmarked, glad to see others documenting stuff with videos.

My sweet little Kodak Zi8 HD takes nice little videos. I attempted to upload it as it was and it was 400 Megs at 720p
so I will see how the youtube upload goes.

aspore · Nov 16, 2011

after checking this site out some more, and others grows, I decided to increase my water levels in order to come up closer to the roots. I still only have the water level at the bottom of the net pot, but this is becoming more and more of a DWC grow, and I might even get rid of the top-drip after plants are a certain age and roots are bulky and in the solution.

I think once I place clones/seedling rockwool cubes into the hydraton, I might top-feed for a month untill the roots establish enough to make it DWC. I am still pondering over this. Finding this site and all it's information has put my brain into a spin....

Ezzer · Nov 17, 2011

aspore said:
Running Hydroponix Nutes (light does) with some homemade compost tea. (kelp, guano, beneficial fungi/bacterium)

Its a small pump, but it's dripping for 1 hour every 3 hours.

It drips from base of stem, down through hydraton, and drains into a DWC-ish setup. Airstone in the bottom.

PPM is @ 1000 right now.

lights are 16 on 8 off.

I have a lot of modifications I wish to make in the future, but I'm really running on a tight budget and low space at the moment. I'm just happy to be growing something. I'll hopefully have a new house soon and some extra cash to get the setup like I really want.

Hi Aspore,

Nice work!
I was wondering why you use a combo of hydro and homemade nutes? I'm playing with hydro in coco but I can't get the coco specific nutes here. Maybe this could be the answer for me too. what's the ppm of your light dose?

aspore · Nov 18, 2011

my light dose is just about 500ppm, but after I add the compost tea, I usually get it up a bit. I was running it at 800-1000, but dropped it because I think it was a little high.

The compost tea is not really as much nutes for the plant as it is also nutes for beneficial fungi/bacteria . I like to help keep as much beneficial 'living' oranisms in the system for a couple of reasons:

- To help break down things that the roots cannot absorb directly

- To help create a mycosphere co-operating with the roots to help bring in water/nutrients more rapidly

- To help maintain a stable enviroment that is not as easily targeted by bad organisms / fungi. Using the good fungi/bacteria to colonize my system/roots, I know they will right off any bad fungi/bacteria which might try to thrive. I believe it's better to have a living defense, than to try to maintain a sterile enviroment.

I make the compost tea from things that will be beneficial to the plant, or are directly beneficial to growth of the organisms I introduce. The Hydroponix nutrients I use, do not contain enough other ingredients to help the microorganisms live.

and air, lots of air.

I really am thinking of putting fish in my resevoirs. I've seen it done but am unsure of the implementations as of yet. I'm going to go buy some of those cheap 10cent fish at petco today, gonna put em in by my roots and see how long they last. Hopefully they won't eat my roots....

Still undecided really...ill let ya know.

On the other hand, I raised the water levels in my buckets to the bottom of the net pot lids/hydraton. The roots that were in air seemed to like this a lot, and I see new growth up near the base. I think it might be better off than giving a few inches of air as I had done before.

Gave them some fresh water/nutes and compost tea when I raised the level. I also cleaned out my whole system very well, and just generally tidied it up, and my plant seems to be doing very well indeed. I defoliated about 6 more big leaves near the bottom.

My clone looks like it's doing okay also, it's 2 days old now so hopefully it will root.

Well, I'm still not 100% on all my nutes and whatnot, i'm up for any suggestions. I think once I have space, I will make about 6 different grow buckets, and run 6 types of nute variants and see what works for me best.

But DWC does seem the way to go for massive, indoor peppers.

aspore · Nov 18, 2011

I used coco to grow once before and DWC is the only thing that I see besides coco for massive roots to be able to grow. Some hydro setups don't have enough space for these monsters to get big. good for lettuce, not for trees.

Also, I never had coco specific nutes, I ran a 2/3 mix of general hydroponic nutrients (technaflora) and added calmag+ for calcium issues.

Ezzer · Nov 18, 2011

aspore said:
I used coco to grow once before and DWC is the only thing that I see besides coco for massive roots to be able to grow. Some hydro setups don't have enough space for these monsters to get big. good for lettuce, not for trees.

Also, I never had coco specific nutes, I ran a 2/3 mix of general hydroponic nutrients (technaflora) and added calmag+ for calcium issues.

Cheers, that helps a lot.

I'm supplementing with calcium and magnesium at the moment any idea what ppm levels of calmag you used?

aspore · Nov 19, 2011

I was using 5ml/ gal with calmag. I would mix it with some water first before I added it to my solution for feeding. Its great stuff, my roots in coco were rootbound in a 4 gallon container. I love coco, but had issues with fruit flies horribly. I'm more dedicated to indoor/hydro with hydraton than coco because of the possibility of contamination / pests. I love coco, but I would only really use it in medium sized greenhouse enviroments because of the pest/contaminant.. issue. Its a wonderful medium though I would say the best if pests were controlled. Allows for tons of roots to healthily grow, but so much dirt-like medium allows for stagnant areas where pests/conatmination can thrive...outdoors/greenhouse it seems best.

aspore · Nov 19, 2011

I never had root rot/conatminant/fungus/bacteria issues, just fruit flies. I could see where these could be a problem though. If you want to go hydro indoors, I would steer clear of coco unless on a 30 or more plant scale...

aspore · Nov 21, 2011

Here's an update. It's been 8 full weeks, so this is the first day of week 9. (give or take)

The plant has definetly gotten a little healthier in the last few days. I believe that bringing the water levels up to the base of the net-pot-lid/hydraton and covering 90% of the root zone is beneficial to the roots. I still think that giving it the extra space from stem to the bottom of the hydraton for air is helpful, but not as much space as I once thought.

I can see where the need for a powerful air pump is present here, my little air pump just isn't putting out the air I wish into my buckets. My first thing I will buy once I find some cash is a powerful multi-out air pump.

I have removed the top-drip water pump for now, as I'm using it to make compost tea. I will be using the top-drip method when I am starting new rockwool seedlings/cuttings in a 5 gallon setup, but since my plants have good root growth, I feel it's not needed for them anymore.

The top of my Bhut I clipped, and instead of one main stalk, I have 4 new stalks growing and splitting off. They are already very thick and i'm pleased with the outcome of the topping, but will try other methods in the future to perhaps gain a few extra shoots. But for now I'm happy with it's top growth.

4 top shoots starting to take off really well

Getting to be big!

I have been defoliating the lower leaves / shoots that appear around the base of the stem. They aren't getting much light, and this gives more airflow, allows plant to focus more energy on top portions of growth.

And roots have grown new lenght, but I have new growth near the base that is more dramatic and probably where the plant is focusing it's energies, since that area was air before, I think having the water level up to the bottom is letting some roots grow that were not willing to before.

Still do not see any roots on the clone yet, but it wasn't the best clone and probably won't do too well. There are new shoots coming up for me to try on so i'll keep you updated on that if successfull.

aspore · Nov 21, 2011

I was looking at the pictues I had posted of roots and did a little comparison:

This is 5 days wherein, on the start of the first I had raised my nutrient solution up to the base of the net-pot-lid. I would say DWC is the way to go!

aspore · Nov 25, 2011

Flowers are forming! I don't have my camera but I have got about 8-10 little flower heads comin up! I didn't want it to flower yet, but I think the temp in my grow-area is too low and it has triggered flowering. That's okay tho, I'll go with it. After flowers form i'll cut back light to 14-10 and to 12-12 a little while after. Roots are still going crazy! Pics to come!

aspore · Nov 27, 2011

Flowers starting to form. About 3-6 little buds on each node.

More flower, kinda hard to see but they are definetly numerous and visible.

And an overall view. Getting pretty tall, I would say about 18-22 inches tall. I've removed most leaves from the main stalk except big water leaves because of air flow and they were not getting light. This is really pushing new growth on the top branches. This plant is a little-beast!

Keep your fingers crossed that these flowers turn into peppers!

aspore · Nov 27, 2011

Also, the stalk is thick where I 'topped' it and very purple. Good'n'strong.