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.
 

 

[tctenten]

I will try to find link for you. But a banned member, QQ had a homemade recipe for ProMix.

 

[tctenten]

http://thehotpepper.com/topic/37333-making-cornell-peat-lite-like-a-boss/

 

[Edmick]

Trent, i'm trying my hardest to make sense of all the charts you've posted but it's a little information overload for my brain so in simple terms, what has been the best mix of seed starting soil you've found so far? I planned on doing a coir, perlite and worm casting mix for my future seedlings. Will be my first time using coir

 

[TrentL]

Trent, i'm trying my hardest to make sense of all the charts you've posted but it's a little information overload for my brain so in simple terms, what has been the best mix of seed starting soil you've found so far? I planned on doing a coir, perlite and worm casting mix for my future seedlings. Will be my first time using coir

 
I didn't have a tray set up like that, but based on the trays I had with worm castings you will have some noticeable mold issues develop after about 3 weeks or so, on unsprouted cells. That might be a big problem for longer germinating stuff - I think that's why my Moruga Butch T sprouting rates were in the crapper. Long germination time + active bacteria is not good. Aji Cerezas, with shorter germination time, didn't seem to mind one bit though. They had 72% and 86% germination in trays with worm castings. 
 
Starter trays have to stay pretty wet for germination, wet + worm turds = perfect growing spot for mold. It makes a petri dish... or tray, basically.
 
Once the plants sprout it's no big deal as you'll run the tray nearly dry between waterings, which puts the brakes on mold. So it's not a big deal if you're doing annuums or fast sprouting (10-12 day) chinense.
 
I would *absolutely* skip the perlite on the sprouting mix. Both perlite and vermiculite caused me to have noticeably slower and lower rates of germination. 
 

Got damn... Reading all this makes me realize the $20 I spend on each bag of fox farm ocean forest is well worth it. I'm sure you're still going to pull off an incredible grow that dwarfs most...and wow, there is a wealth of info here for everyone.

 
I'm getting pretty close to figuring some things out lol. But yeah, I hear you. I could have dropped a grand and just had all my soil delivered in nice baggies on pretty pallets and moved on with life. 
 
This week you'll see results in side by side tests on 6 new batches of stuff, including a comparison of passive hydro, as a benchmark. Got it all potted up this afternoon using identical seedlings from various trays. 
 
I'm a little excited about mixes J, and L. I went back through all the notes, all the data, all the deaths, all the symptoms, and started connecting some dots today. Mix K is drafted but I have to let some bacteria do it's thing - I've recycled all past failed tests (160 pots) in to a big batch of stuff, lighting it up with massive doses of bacteria, and letting it compost for a week. Once it settles down and isn't hot to the touch (!!!) I'll start those tests.
 
I think I am getting close to that "ding" moment when the light bulb goes off.  
 
Or maybe I'm just a sadist who is overly optimistic.
 
Jury is still out.

 

[TrentL]

Trent, i'm trying my hardest to make sense of all the charts you've posted but it's a little information overload for my brain so in simple terms, what has been the best mix of seed starting soil you've found so far? I planned on doing a coir, perlite and worm casting mix for my future seedlings. Will be my first time using coir

 
Also stay tuned for daily side by sides of the latest tests; I've got a passive hydroponic chemical set of pots for a benchmark vs. various new organic mixes coming up over the next week+.
 
Figured I got freebies of hydroponics fert in the mail so why the hell not.

 

[Chilidude]

What hydroponic ferts did you get as a freebies?

 

[TrentL]

What hydroponic ferts did you get as a freebies?

 
Suite Leaf stuff mostly. I gave the plants in the passive hydro test a 1/2 dose of 12-0-0 mix tonight to get them started. Next watering they'll get a little cal mag infusion as well as the other 1/2 dose of 12-0-0. If they start tinging purple, they'll also get a little dose of phosphorous as well.

 

[Edmick]

I don't have a ton of slow germinating chinense on the grow list for the business ( just the common ones that I think people will buy, like ghosts, reapers and scotch bonnets) but those ones i'm germinating in paper towels first. I don't like using the paper towel method at all but the idea of not wasting precious cell space on things that aren't going to germinate is important given my situation and the size of my grow.. I need them out of the grow room and outside as quickly as possible so i'm hoping that with good air circulation and minimal time spent in germinating trays, I can avoid any mold issues. It sounds good in theory but fingers crossed that everything works out as planned.

 

[TrentL]

I don't have a ton of slow germinating chinense on the grow list for the business ( just the common ones that I think people will buy, like ghosts, reapers and scotch bonnets) but those ones i'm germinating in paper towels first. I don't like using the paper towel method at all but the idea of not wasting precious cell space on things that aren't going to germinate is important given my situation and the size of my grow.. I need them out of the grow room and outside as quickly as possible so i'm hoping that with good air circulation and minimal time spent in germinating trays, I can avoid any mold issues. It sounds good in theory but fingers crossed that everything works out as planned.

 
Well, sounds like you're avoiding the problem I had. I had 15 out of 30 trays with under 50% germination; 12 of those were clearly dud seeds (multiple trays of orange and red habaneros that went 0%).  Then mixed results on single variety (30-40% germination on MOA scotch bonnets). 
 
That was exactly half of my initial grow tied up with nothing. I had room for 30 trays, and when only half of them come up, ugh.
 
But then again, I would have been more "ugh" if I'd been faced with trying to figure out how to sprout 2,500 seeds on wet paper towels and keeping all that straight lol.
 
I don't have a controller for my grow mats, they have one temp. That temp is about 127 degrees. This works fine when you have a 1020 tray with ridged bottom and starter cells floating above that, when the tray is filled the water temp stays in the high 80's, until the cells absorb the water, then the bottom of the tray releases humidity until it runs dry, keeping the cells moist longer but without raising the temps. If I  had to directly place stuff on those mats I would need a temp controller to bring the mat temperature down a lot.
 
(I suspect this is why Devv's mats "ran hot" - they were designed for use with a tray that has an airgap, not directly laying seeds directly ln it for sprouting; he rigged a dimmer on to them to bring them down)
 
Now the trays have a secondary purpose; I have them laying on concrete under the tables with starter trays on them, while the tables themselves are occupied with sprouting trays that have sprouted. I have five longer-germ annuums sitting under the tables right now.... hoping they don't sprout before I get some of the stuff on the tables cleared off.

 

[TrentL]

So the next week or two will be all about "nutes and seedlings"....
 
True leaves first showed on trays 7-10 four days ago. I decided to use these for the next soil experiment to test whether the soils cause catastrophic deaths, as I just tossed 160 of my first transplants in the garbage... going to be a little more cautious about quantity I use on tests from now on.
 
So 6 pepper varieties were potted up over the course of 5 tests.  We'll call these group 1-5.
 
Group 1-3 is soil test J ("stinky fish mix"). It is
 
5:1 mix of coir and pearlite 
 
mixed in ratio with "stinky fish mix"
 
5:1 mix of coir and pearlite
1 cup fish bone meal / 6 gallons of media
1 cup blood meal / 6 gallons of media
1 cup kelp meal / 6 gallons of media
1/2 cup azomite / 6 gallons of media
80 ounces Great White mycorhizae solution / 18 gal of media, left to rest and colonize bacteria and fungus for 3 days
 
mixed with the following in various ratios:
 
Mix J1 was 5:1 coir/pearlite base mixed 1:1 with the stinky fish mix rested 3 days
Mix J2 was 5:1 coir/pearlite, base mixed 2:1 with the stinky fish mix rested 3 days
Mix J3 was 5:1 coir/pearlite, base mixed 3:1 with the stinky fish mix rested 3 days
 
 
(This mix will be re-tested on every 3 day intervals to watch different results if they form, off of soil "hotness" - organic soil apparently needs resting time before use)
 
Group 4 is marked "HYD" (for passive soil-less hydroponic fertilizers). It is 5:1 coir / pearlite with no organic fertiliers. It will only receive liquid hydroponic fertilizers on 6.5 ph calibrated doses. (Schedule to be determined on the fly; first dose was 2.25 ounces each of 1.23ml / 1.89L - 1/4 teaspoon in half gal - of 12-0-0)
 
Group 5 is Soil Test L;
 
4:2:1 coir / perlite / worm castings
1/2 cup per 7 gallons of media, blood meal
1/2 cup per 7 gallons of media, fish bone meal
1/2 cup per 7 gallons of media, azomite
 
Post transplant: 2.25 oz of Great White solution added to each 4" pot
 
Soil Test L is also "resting" in a bin (about 6 gallons worth) so subsequent series of L can be tested at various "resting intervals" to see if initial behavior changes over time (which is a good thing as I am already seeing signs of acute toxicity on 3-day rested J mix soil 24 hours post transplant!).
 
 
Pictures from 24 hours since transplanting are already perking my interest.
 
 
Big Sun Habanero (Tray 10)
 
Group 1 (J1 1:1 dilution)

 
1/J1 is already (after 24 hours) showing signs of acute nutrient toxicity. (Keep in mind that's with dry organic ferts... the 3 day "burn time" on the stinky fish mix converted a TON of nitrogen already...)
 
 
 
Big Sun Habanero (Tray 10)
 
Group 2 (J2; mix J 2:1 dilution)

 

 
Group 2 is showing signs of nitrogen toxicity. No burning yet, but heavy leaf curl and odd mix of interveinal chlorosis and darking of interveinal regions. 
 
 
Big Sun Habanero (Tray 10)
 
Group 3 (J3; mix J 4:1 dilution)
 
NIIIITROOOGEEEEN!!!!
 

 

 
Group 3 is still showing signs of "I GOTTT NIIIIIITRROOOOOGEEEEEEN!" but not at the acute toxic levels of J1/J2. In fact, it looks damn near indistinguishable from the Hydro group 4.

 
Big Sun Habanero (Tray 10)
 
Group 4 (passive hydro)
I GOT NITROGEN, YO. CHEMS RULE.
 

 

 
Good darkening of interveinal regions, some leaf curling up as all 4 have shown so far, *MIGHT* have been a little heavy on the first nitrogen watering here. 12-0-0 diluted approx 1:4 of normal strength might have been a *touch* much for these little fellas.
 
But it seems happy enough so far! (Might need some phosphorous next fert run to straighten up those leaves)
 
 
Big Sun Habanero (Tray 10)
 
Group 5 (soil mix L, "worm shit cold mix")
 

 

 
You know, if I didn't have labels on the pots, I wouldn't be able to tell THIS mix apart from the hydro pot. I mean, for all intents and purposes, they are identical. Good interveinal darkening, from their original starting tray nitrogen-starved state. Same leaf upward cupping evident in all other Hab transplants.

Starter Tray sibling reference shot:
 

 
Leaves yellow-ish, shows signs of nitrogen deficiency (as is typical with starter tray soilless media, no nutrients available for them)
 
 
 
 
Yellow fatalli to follow...
 

 

[TrentL]

Yellow Fatali 
 
Group 1 - J1 (stinky fish 1:1)
 

 

 
Acute nutrient toxicity showing on cotys (dead spots forming)
 
Yellow Fatali 
 
Group 2 - J2 (stinky fish 2:1)
 

 

 
Acute nutrient toxicity showing (no dead spots, but cotys tips are browning)
 

Yellow Fatali 
 
Group 3 - J3 (stinky fish 4:1)
 

 

 
Slight nutrient toxicity showing (tips of cotys are yellowing)

 
Yellow Fatali 
 
Group 4 - HYD
 
NIIIITROOOOOGEEEEEN!
 

 

 
Man, that passive hydroponics shit takes effect FAST. The leaves are already darkening up properly from their nitrogen-starved state in the starter tray.
 
 
 

Yellow Fatali 
 
Group 5 - L (worm crap mix)
 

 

 
Daaaaaamn. This is about as good as it gets. Those look beautiful, no curling, leaves flattening properly, veins darkening up well, intraveinal regions darking up well... just.. perfect. 
 
I hope Group L doesn't get "hot" as the bacteria starts to break down the blood meal. The omission of kelp should help.
 
 

 

[TrentL]

Whoops that last photo on the Habanero portion of the test was the fatalli starter tray.
 
This is the Hab starter tray for reference of cell mate siblings;
 

 

[TrentL]

I'll add daily updates to that test.
 
I have a gut feeling J1 & 2 are going to be fatalities, and quickly.
 
J3 may pull through for a while, but if that soil isn't done "cooking" I don't know if a 4:1 dilution is enough to make it "safe".
 
I was NOT expecting such rapid toxicity. This explains a LOT about why my last couple batches curled up and died. Same mix as they used, but instead of transplanting immediately I let it rest and cook for a few days. The amount of available nitrogen to the plants is astonishing. Even diluted 1:1 from the last seedlings I put out, at the 3 day mark it has absolutely lethal levels of nitrogen in the soil!
 
I sure as hell did NOT expect a dry fert organics grow to kick out THAT much nutrients, that fast. Shows the lag time on processing organics down to NH4 and NH3 are not nearly as long as I thought they were. That bacteria works frigging FAST.
 
Also explains why my first 199 transplants died so damn fast.
 
 

 

[TrentL]

Also keep in mind these plants are babies. They developed first true leaves only 4-5 days ago. They are nowhere near their forking/ 2nd set of true leaves. 
 
This is important for folks who still think seedlings get all their nutrients from the seeds they're hatched in until they put on more true leaves.
 
Holding them in starter trays of peat / coir much past the 3-4 day mark on emergence of true leaves will stall them out.
 
They *are* tricky to transplant that young. You have to be very gentle to avoid screwing up roots or stem. You also have to take great care on how the roots are arranged when potting them up; if they have long roots, get those down to the bottom of the pot! don't just transplant the plug. Spread the roots out!
 

 

[Edmick]

Looks good trent. Just got back from another expensive trip. Nothing compared to what you're spending but expensive nonetheless. Just need to figure out my mixtures now.

 

[Edmick]

Trent are you using t5s or t8s? I know I saw your lighting setup on one of the pages but I can't find it now

 

[TrentL]

Trent are you using t5s or t8s? I know I saw your lighting setup on one of the pages but I can't find it now

 
T5, 4' 8 bulb 6500k

 

[TrentL]

Effect of Nutrients on Seedlings Pt 2
 
This is a big sun Habanero tray started 2/7/2018 with 100% coir (tray 10)
 

 
This is a big sun Habanero tray started 2/10/2018 (3 days later) with 100% coir + some various dry organics
 

 
It's pretty much caught up to the earlier tray, with greener leaves.
 
 
Effects of Vermiculite compression on seedlings:
 
Aji Cereza, seeded same day, same micronutrients;
 
Without vermiculite:
 

 
With vermiculite
 

 
Without vermiculite tray density (86% germination)
 

 
With vermiculite tray density (72% germination)
 

 
 
Clearly it's visible that seeds planted the same day, with dry vermiculite (which expands causing compression) drastically affects both germination rate and plant development speed.
 
Also it's pretty incontrovertible at this point that nutrients in the sprouting soil help true leaves develop faster. BUT, at the risk of mold, for longer-germ species (My butch-t sprout rates should have been much higher, as one example)
 
Keep in mind those two Aji trays showed first true leaves only 3 days ago, they are rapidly developing. Just as the habanero true leaves; the second tray sprouted later, and had vermiculite compression issues, but STILL caught up with the 100% coir after only a few days, despite the 3 day head start on 100% coir.
 
I wasn't sure when I started what would happen but it's becoming clearer that aeration isn't too important on seedlings; and have unilaterally delayed development, but nutrients sure as hell are important, and *do* rapidly speed up development once true leaves first bud up and emerge.
 
 

 

[TrentL]

Looks good trent. Just got back from another expensive trip. Nothing compared to what you're spending but expensive nonetheless. Just need to figure out my mixtures now.

 
Are you starting them out in sprouting trays? Or you seeding cups? or ??
 
1 cup of worm turds per gallon of media (which I would just use straight coir for sprouting)  worked out well for me. But don't do it on things that take longer than 12 days to sprout! You'll mold your seeds to death if you do.  That's the exact same bags of worm castings I'm using, BTW.
 
If you're doing cups I'd do 5:1 coir / pearlite with 1 cup of worm turds per gallon, or 2:1 coir / perlite if you do 2 cups of worm turds per gallon of media (worm turds heavy up the mixture so you'll need more aeration if you use more of them.). This last mix I'm testing uses 1:7 ratio of worm turds (1 gallon of worm castings, 2 gallons perlite, 4 gallons coir).
 
ALSO... big time important.. get some mycorrhizae (I used Great White, but any myco stuff should work) to avoid mildew issues if you use worm turds in the bigger cups. My worm turds came free of charge with some pretty nasty bad fungus ... you need something to offset that. 
 
I actually did a 40 oz bottom watering of mycorrhizae in my 72 cell starter trays at the emergence of first true leaves without any adverse side effects. I figured on giving the plants a head start on micro-biotics wouldn't hurt, and it didn't.
 
The fatality of the mixes I *think* I've pinned down to blood meal and (especially) kelp meal, but the jury is still out, I'm testing more, trying to find a workable ratio that will not be fatal to young peppers.
 
Tomatoes are proving MUCH harder to kill. What was absolutely toxic to peppers... the tomatoes are by and large LIVING through. Which is just stunning to me. I can't believe how fragile peppers are compared to 'maters.
 
If you are sprouting in trays, personally, I'd just use 100% coir and plan on transplanting them out when true leaves first show up (a day or two after they form). That'd avoid the mold issue I had on the organic trays completely, give you good germination rates, and not hurt the development of the plants until you move them to more permanent homes. Plus you'd get to see the results of this latest round of dry organics before you decide what to do next?
 

 

[Edmick]

 
Are you starting them out in sprouting trays? Or you seeding cups? or ??
 
1 cup of worm turds per gallon of media (which I would just use straight coir for sprouting)  worked out well for me. But don't do it on things that take longer than 12 days to sprout! You'll mold your seeds to death if you do.  That's the exact same bags of worm castings I'm using, BTW.
 
If you're doing cups I'd do 5:1 coir / pearlite with 1 cup of worm turds per gallon, or 2:1 coir / perlite if you do 2 cups of worm turds per gallon of media (worm turds heavy up the mixture so you'll need more aeration if you use more of them.). This last mix I'm testing uses 1:7 ratio of worm turds (1 gallon of worm castings, 2 gallons perlite, 4 gallons coir).
 
ALSO... big time important.. get some mycorrhizae (I used Great White, but any myco stuff should work) to avoid mildew issues if you use worm turds in the bigger cups. My worm turds came free of charge with some pretty nasty bad fungus ... you need something to offset that. 
 
I actually did a 40 oz bottom watering of mycorrhizae in my 72 cell starter trays at the emergence of first true leaves without any adverse side effects. I figured on giving the plants a head start on micro-biotics wouldn't hurt, and it didn't.
 
The fatality of the mixes I *think* I've pinned down to blood meal and (especially) kelp meal, but the jury is still out, I'm testing more, trying to find a workable ratio that will not be fatal to young peppers.
 
Tomatoes are proving MUCH harder to kill. What was absolutely toxic to peppers... the tomatoes are by and large LIVING through. Which is just stunning to me. I can't believe how fragile peppers are compared to 'maters.
 
If you are sprouting in trays, personally, I'd just use 100% coir and plan on transplanting them out when true leaves first show up (a day or two after they form). That'd avoid the mold issue I had on the organic trays completely, give you good germination rates, and not hurt the development of the plants until you move them to more permanent homes. Plus you'd get to see the results of this latest round of dry organics before you decide what to do next?
 

They're all getting started in 72 cell trays then transplanted straight into 4 inch nursery pots which is what they'll be sold in. So you think just straight coir in the cells? No liquid nutes or anything to help them along?