2018 - The Farm

Well, I've been gone a few years from the board, and away from growing peppers, but looks like life is pushing me back that way again. 
 
I recently (last month) closed on a 25 acre farm in Central Illinois with some primo soil, and I'm going to give a commercial grow a test run. 
 

 

 
From up on the roof, when I was doing some roof repairs on the outbuildings. Not much as far as the eye can see, but cornfields...
 

 
 
Has a 4 stall garage and a horse stable on the property
 

 

 

 
Probably do my grow room upstairs here after I insulate it
 

 
Built some doors for the horse barn and patched the roof last month
 

 

 
 
Anyway just dropped a cold grand on seeds from pepperlover and buckeye, going to hit a greenhouse supplier up for other materials next week.
 
Have plans to build a 30x72' greenhouse in the spring, and a ~1200 sq foot dedicated grow room. Too late really to help with this year's grow, but next year it'll save me a lot of hassle on hardening off. 
 
The greenhouse, I am going to do a piped infloor heat slab, with a horizontal loop geothermal system (I own a mini excavator) that is solar powered. So heating should be nice, uniform, not create heat / cold bubbles, and not dry out plants like forced air would. I build circuit boards in my day job, so I will also build a microcontroller to handle the automated watering system with soil moisture monitors and actuated plumbing valves on the water supply.
 
Also plan on building a "deep winter" greenhouse for year round production. Got blueprints I made from a couple of years back, those are walled on three sides with heavy duty insulation, with the glass wall side angled to face winter solstice, so you can grow in the deep freeze months of the north. In the summer, those get hot enough to use as a natural dehydrator, replace the tables with racks for bulk drying.
 
Only doing a half acre or so of peppers to start with this year, the balance will be put in corn. I can't manage more than that with the labor I have available. (When you start talking thousands of plants, simple tasks like up-potting grow in to hundreds or thousands of man hours...)
 
Going to hire some local kids to help, school has a good ag co-op program for high schoolers, they can get school credit working on local farms. Since the plant out and harvest doesn't conflict too badly with corn, shouldn't have a problem finding labor around here.
 
Anyway, that's the plans.
 
We'll see how it goes.. er.. grows.
 

 

[TrentL]

24 of the absolute worst, most dreadfully sad dying plants you've ever seen got a shot of chemical fertilizer tonight. I marked the tags with a "C" underneath the soil & tray numbers, so I'd be able to keep them straight from the "organic" ones. 
 
I don't know if it's too late for them, probably is, with their roots dying / dead. I made sure the leaves got a good healthy coating as well, hopefully they'll .. you know.. stop dying. 
 
I'm about to give up completely on "going organic" and just grow some damn peppers the way I always used to.
 
 

 

[TrentL]

Hard to tell... You still on track to have the amount of plants you were planning on at plant out?

 
Oh shit no, we're a long way from that. I needed 1500 out of this first batch to survive.  I had 939 sprouts, out of 2160 seeded - entire TRAYS didn't sprout, which means I got some bad seeds (more on that later, when I "spill the beans" on what seeds from what suppliers germinated what %).
 
100 of the first 200 transplants are dead or dying, horribly slow wilting deaths. Fungus killed the roots off on those. (Not the good fungus, but the bad fungus.) That was isolated to worm castings + bottom watering + high tap water pH. Horrible deadly combination, that. 
 
The other 200 were inoculated with Great White at plant out, skipped the worm castings and the bottom watering. I don't think they'll die, but I might have to end up resorting to chemical fertilizers to get them to live. There's not enough microorganism activity to break down the organic dry fertilizers OR the fish emulsion, yet. Not sure what to do about that, other than maybe inoculate the media a week or two *before* I pot-up?
 
So that knocks me down to about 800. 939-138 dead and/or dying from first two transplants. If the next 100 don't make it (leaving 700), I'm going back to chemical fertilizers; so I assume that the remainder of the 700 will live and prosper as they've always done in past years with chemicals.
 
That will leave me at 700 out of a planned 1500 chinense. (I was expecting closer to 75% germination on the 2160 seeded, but I have 8 whole trays which never sprouted one seedling  and a few more trays in single digit germination % - all of which from the same seed supplier!)  That's a massive loss in planned production. Out of three types of Habaneros I ordered from that supplier, one had 92% germination and the other two types had ZERO. And that was *supposed* to be the bulk of my chinense! They were done in the same exact media, under the same exact sprouting conditions, as other chinense that got 90+% germination.
 
That knocks out 2/3rd's of my Habanero crop, right there. There were several other seeds from that supplier that had zero percent, or < 10%.
 
Anyway, leaves me more than a little aggravated, but shit happens. 
 
The only thing I can do (not enough time to replant chinense) is to really ramp up the Annuum production to fill the rest of the field. Instead of seeding 36 trays (2500) I'll seed 60 trays (4,320) next week. It's going to make a hell of a lot of extra work as I'll have to do half of that at the farm, which adds a ton of back & forth driving to keep an eye on the little guys. But whatever. Gotta get done.

 

[TrentL]

Oops. Let things get too dry while busy with other stuff today, had a few transplants keel over.  I mean, they were probably on the way out anyway, but anything with roots shallower than an inch is likely KIA at this point. 
 
I even had some tomatoes keel over that I transplanted two days ago. THAT takes talent. It's pretty hard to kill a mater!
 
I expect the tomatoes to stand back up again; I've seen 'em do it before.
 
Mostly.
 
 

 

[tctenten]

Damn. Sucks that you are having so many issues. I would assume it is somewhat expected in a grow this size.

 

[TrentL]

Damn. Sucks that you are having so many issues. I would assume it is somewhat expected in a grow this size.

 
Well, probably not, once you get a good system down. 
 
I'm still at the "winging it" stage and compounding it by trying to do an organic grow, which I've never done before, even on a small scale.
 
I think at this juncture I'm going to cut my losses and switch to chem fertilizers this year. I can always revisit organic stuff in future years (and do test grows indoors on the off season, to further try to get it down). 
 
Bottom line, I can stay 'organic', not have a crop, or much of one, and lose my ass bad this year. Or I can go back to the way I've always done it, with predictably good results, and try to make some money to cover the big expenses I've gone through to get set up.
 
We'll see how the next week plays out on the latest (and last) organic mixes. 
 
If they fail, I already know what I'm doing on the next pot-up. 

 

[tctenten]

Not sure how this compares cost wise, but I love this stuff and so does my plants.

 

[Genetikx]

Man, I could probably guess which supplier has weak germ rates so can't wait for you to spill the beans. Let's just say it's not good when you get seeds that look burnt around all seed edges, from a very reputable supplier.

It's almost too late, but still not too late. Hit up Justin at whitehotpeppers.com.... Think you might know him from years ago

 

[TrentL]

Nah, it's too late for starting more Chinense. Especially Habaneros and MOA's. 110-120 day maturity cycles would put me at end of June before they even started flowering. To get ripe pods by the end of the year.. man I dunno.
 
So, the last of the organic experiments is underway.
 
From my observations:
 
* Dry organic mixes don't work. Kelp has a *little* available nitrogen right off the bat, but not much. Blood meal has a little as well, but not again, not much.
 
Adding 1 cup of kelp, blood meal, and bone meal / 5-6 gallons of media gives about a 48 hour window where plants are "ok"
 
Reducing that to 1/2 cup of kelp or blood meal reduces the window to about 24 hours before leaf tips start showing chlorosis.
 
Eliminating the kelp or cutting the blood meal and kelp in half (together) shows massive chlorosis within 12 hours.
 
Why is this? Because there's nothing breaking the organic matter down in to it's elements. No bacteria or fungus gnawing away at those complex organic structures and pooping out nutrients on the other end.
 
Same with bone meal. Plants further along in this organic experiment show *massive* phosphorous deficiencies, to the point of death. Even with 1 cup bone meal / 5 gallons of media (which is a rather strong concentration). 
 
* Fish Emulsion does not become immediately available. There literally nothing in it which plants can use "right now" - it again, requires breakdown by micro organisms for plants to make use of it. 
 
So while fish emulsion may eventually give "5-1-1" or whatever is advertised, without a good microorganism population, and time, it can't do jack squat. It's not like chemical fertilizers where you're literally drenching soil in pure NO3 or whatever that the plants can immediately use.
 
Now that doesn't mean it's bad. But it's slower than chems and without the micro-organism population it will do nothing.
 
Sooo....
 
With that in mind...
 
The last of the experiments.
 
I mixed together 18.75 gallons of "Mix E" tonight - which was the one which showed the best results overall. 
 
It is separated in 3 bins, 6.25 gallons each.  
 
In one bin I added 40 oz of Great White solution.
 
In the second bin I added 28 oz (I was going for 20 but got stupid and did 28..)
 
In the third bin I added 10 oz (figured I'd cut bin 2 in exactly half)
 
I will wait 2 days to let the cultures get moving... and begin potting up a pair of plants each day thereafter until the mix proves fatal, or it's all gone.
 
Eventually it'll turn fatal to plants as the bacteria "digests" enough of the organic matter to make it too strong for the plants (they will show toxicity and nute burn, instead of fading away)
 
At *some* point I should find both the right *amount* of micro organisms and the right amount of "cooking duration" to let them set up in the mix.
 
Now it's a pretty potent mix of dry fertilizer but again, I'm watching plants wither and die of nutrient starvation in "pretty potent soil mixes" so this is the only thing I can think of.
 
It'll basically remove the "time lag" of processing the organic matter in to usable forms, in advance of the plants going in to the mix. 
 
Anyway, will report back in a few days... once my little petri dishes in the basement get going....
 
 

 

[TrentL]

Man, I could probably guess which supplier has weak germ rates so can't wait for you to spill the beans. Let's just say it's not good when you get seeds that look burnt around all seed edges, from a very reputable supplier.

It's almost too late, but still not too late. Hit up Justin at whitehotpeppers.com.... Think you might know him from years ago

 
Oh I won't keep you waiting any longer. Sorry about that. Not like it's a super-secret or anything, I just rambled on and forgot to say who it was.
 
Tray 13 - 1 of 72 (1%) - 2/8/2018 - 20 days - 7-Pot Chaguanas, ordered from Buckeye (was 2 for 6 on the test trays which are at 33 days - but those 2 that popped were 5 year old seeds I'd saved. Of the BE seeds I was 0 for 6.)
 
Tray 14 - 0 of 72 (0%) -2/9/2018 - 19 days - Orange Habaneros, ordered from Buckeye (0/6 on the test trays @ 33 days)
 
Tray 16 - 0 of 72 (0%) -2/9/2018 - 19 days - Brown Moruga, ordered from Pepperlover (0/6 on the test trays @ 33 days)
 
Tray 17 - 0 of 72 (0%) - 2/9/2018 - 19 days - Red Habanero, ordered from Buckeye (plus 0/6 on the test trays @ 33 days)
 
Tray 18 - 7 of 72 (10%) - 2/9/2018 - 19 days - Moruga Scorpion Red, ordered from Pepperlover (0 for 6 on test trays @ 33 days)
 
Tray 20 - 0 of 72 (0%) - 2/10/2018 - 18 days - Red Habanero, ordered from Buckeye (0 for 6 on test trays)
 
Tray 21 - 0 of 72 (0%) - 2/10/2018 - 18 days -Orange Habanero, ordered from Buckeye (0 for 6 on test trays)
 
Tray 23 - 8 of 72 (11%) - 2/11/2018 - 17 days - Moruga Butch-T, ordered from Pepperlover - these may still pop good, was 5 for 6 in the test trays at 33 days, germination spread between 8 and 18 days though on those, so not too hopeful. Unless they all pop tomorrow lol.)
 
Tray 24 - 4 of 72 (6%) - 2/11/2018 - 17 days - Bhut Jolokia Brown, ordered from Pepperlover - these may still pop, dunno. I was 0 for 6 on the test trays so they might also just be long germination.)
 
 
MOA Scotch Bonnets have been pretty bad overall. I've got 136 sprouts out of 366 seeds, so only 37%. Those came from Pepperlover. Those were the only packs of anything that had a high percentage of "dark" seeds too. 
 
Aji Dulce are also very very low % right now, but I have no idea how long of germination they're at. I am 2 for 6 after 33 days on the test trays. I'm 7 of 144 on the two trays I planted out. Those also came from Pepperlover.
 
Although, to be fair, she gave me about 6x more of them than I ordered, so I'm not too awfully upset about low germ rates.  That held true across the board, WAY more than I was expecting. Some packs had like 30+ seeds in each. 
 
Buckeye on the other hand, having a large amount of no-shows is kind of a big deal since they're pretty close to the 10-per-bag they advertise. Having a lot of no-shows sucks when you drop about $500 on a single order. 
 
Ordering up some 30 packs of Habaneros and striking completely out on 20 of 30 packs is a pretty damn big deal when you were wanting to fill multiple rows at a farm with habaneros....

 

[tctenten]

Wow. I have had much different results with Buckeye.

 

[TrentL]

Wow. I have had much different results with Buckeye.

 
This was the first year I ordered from them. Other stuff, had no problems with. The Big Sun habaneros I got off of them sprouted 92%, which is pretty good. But the orange and reds .. nadda. At least I will have some habaneros in the field. Not nearly as many as I wanted, but some is better than none, I guess. 
 
MOA's were going to be the "other" medium heat produce but I struck out pretty bad on those, too. 
 
I've had good rates with pepper lover in the past but she was out of a lot of stuff by the time I put my order together in January.  
 
Quite a lot of the annuums I ordered had 0% sprout in the test trays I did in Jan, too. So I think I might be in for some mixed results there as well. 
 
It's frustrating to see 92-96% germination in trays right next to duds. Wasted space. I only have room to do 32 trays at a time, and when 9 trays are in zero or single digit %'s and 4 more trays of MOA's are in the mid 30% range, it's kind of gut wrenching.
 
Right there, on those 13 trays, I lost nearly 40% of my hot crop right out of the gate. 
 
Then I lose another 18% more on organic soil testing.
 
So I'm facing the start of a season with 58% losses already and we aren't even in to March yet. What a way to get this adventure underway.
 
It's a bit depressing, but hopefully I can get some annuums to pop with good %. 
 
If not I'll order a whole bunch more tomato seeds. Gotta have SOMETHING to show for this year.
 
And those organic mixes, while they might not be working well for the peppers, but the tomatoes seem to like it... damn things have quadrupled in size in 2 days..

 

[PtMD989]

I don’t know if this is feasible but I came across this. http://nyp.st/2EX4ctH


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[The Hot Pepper]

Damn dude, awesome plot of land there. It's beautiful.

 

[TrentL]

I don’t know if this is feasible but I came across this. http://nyp.st/2EX4ctH


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 
Heh yeah I dunno, at this point I'm willing to grow anything for a buck. Spent 320k on the land, 20k on improvements, plus another 15k on all this pepper stuff, lighting, etc. Another 40k on a tractor (plus attachments on top of that)... 400K invested, I better have SOME sort of turn around or my wife is going to use *ME* as organic fertilizer.
 

Damn dude, awesome plot of land there. It's beautiful.

 
Thanks, appreciate it. What an honor to get the admin to pay a visit.
 
I hope it wasn't the S word I let slip earlier yesterday, frustrations mounting, and all that.

 

[TrentL]

For you data lovers out there;

This is where things are at right now. I don't expect much more in the way of germinations to happen on the first 30 trays. Some are getting pretty long in the tooth (about ready to get transplanted) and the rates have tapered off to the point I'm only taking counts every other day. 
 

 
 
This is how it breaks down by variety and sprouting medium. I was a little surprised here that the organic trays with worm poop did so well; they were moldy but the plants don't seem to care one bit. The worst performers were the ones with vermiculite added in.
 
Dark green are best performers in test trays (tray 6 still has 9 viable transplants I haven't done yet so I marked it dark green)
 
Light green are best performers of a specific variety where multiple growing mediums were compared against one another.
 
Yellow are satisfactory performers of a single tray test (not enough seeds / space to do controls on those)
 

 
Trays 31 and 32 are repeats of controls with calibrated 6.5 pH with and without warming mats. One is to determine if pH had an effect on the low MOA sprouting percent while keeping it on the mats. The other is to test reapers sprouting % without warming mats (mainly for time duration, to see if it's significantly different than the tray sprouted off of mats)
 

 

[TrentL]

Now that the Chinense are about done, and I'll soon have room again to sprout more... this is what the annuum grow will look like. 
 
I haven't decided what soil mixes or conditions I'm testing here. Straight coir gave a pretty good % germination. But coir + organic dry ferts actually did a little better as far as % germination goes, overall - no idea *why* exactly, but the trend held across the board on stuff. Vermiculite is *right* out as I had such a high % difference in germination rates with vermiculite added in on comparable trays. The verdict is out still on transplant viability - with the staggered start dates I don't know how the true leaf to first fork development speed is going to look like between them quite yet. Or how yellow or green those leaves are gonna be... soon, though. Soon I'll know.
 
So I'll wait to plot out a mess of experiments until I get the transplanting going on the chinense.
 

 

 

[TrentL]

(I'll be adding to that list, every annuum seed I can scavenge is going in to trays, I've *got* to get that field populated with plants after the horrible chinense start...)
 
If anyone has some spare faster-growing chinense or annuums they want to contribute, I'm certainly not above begging and grovelling at this point lol. I'm also not particularly picky about what I grow as long as it stands a reasonable chance of selling in a farmers market. I can kick back a few bucks or even ship out a bricks or two of that massive coco coir stockpile I hoarded like some insane organic dragon.
 
 
 
 

 

[PtMD989]

I have some ( about 20)Cayenne seeds you are welcome to, if you want them.
Full disclosure: they are from Bonnie plant pods I grew last year and the year before. The pods were vine ripened and then dried in a window ,the seeds have been stored in my fridge since then. I haven’t had good luck getting them to germinate, but I don’t have to best condition for germ these. No heat pad, no grow lights and I used dirt from my garden as a medium.
There’re yours if you want them, no hard feelings if you don’t.


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[TrentL]

Appreciate the offer, really do, but sort of need enough to fill a 72 cell 10/20 tray or it makes recordkeeping a pain.
 
I'll do some seed counting tonight and see how far I can stretch. I still have a few leftover seeds from 2012-13-14 I can dig in to. Not sure if they'll grow true (probably NOT) as a lot were open pollinated stuff I set aside for my own amusement.. but heck, a pepper is a pepper and maybe I'll get another funky cayenne / jalapeno cross that comes out looking like twisted peckers.
 

 

[Devv]

Keep your chin up Trent; this is a huge endeavor with some learning curves for sure. Still not too late for Chinense, mine are at less than 90 days since sowing. Red Bhuts (ghosts) should move as everyone knows what they are...
 
We're all pulling for ya!
 
And PS: Jalapenos, Bells, Poblanos, should sell locally