2019 Hay Bale Pepper Patch

I've been a member for a while but never posted a grow log. My usual garden is too boring for that. I use 20-30 pots and overwinter my mama plants in a hillbilly winter shelter. Our ground here isn't good for in soil gardening and I've not been enthused enough to undertake the work and expense to build raised beds.
 
Now I have my peppers working the way I want and have the need for a much larger grow to supply a project. The main peppers I'll grow will be reaper, douglah and fatalii. For a couple of years I'll do hay bale gardens and heap tons of organic trash into the area. I have monumental amounts of pine straw, oak leaves and bonfire ash every year to dump in the walkways. I think this will do a world of good to make this new garden area mo'betta for eventual in ground growing.
 
I closed off a 38x38 patch in the NE field that gets full sun. This is the area I chose. The big painted guy is my fertilizer supplier.
 
The little painted guy is my running buddy and load inspector.
 
 

 

[DWB]

After slicing and drying and losing as many seeds as possible, the 9.93 pounds made 1.15 pounds of rough flake. Nice stuff. Looks like some corn flakes

 

[CaneDog]

Heck yes! Pour those bad boys into a bowl with some milk and get to it!

 

[DWB]

Heck yes! Pour those bad boys into a bowl with some milk and get to it!

Oh yeah! Toss on a couple spoons of the capsaicin crystals to liven it up That should toot anybody's horn.

 

[ahayastani]

Oh yeah! Toss on a couple spoons of the capsaicin crystals to liven it up That should toot anybody's horn.

They look like vanillin crystals, can't be bad for making icecream or cakes

 

[DWB]

They look like vanillin crystals, can't be bad for making icecream or cakes

There may be a good reason for a resemblance. The short chemical name for capsaicin is 8-methyl-N-vanillyl-6-nonenamide.

 

[Downriver]

The short chemical name for capsaicin is 8-methyl-N-vanillyl-6-nonenamide.

Now you're startin to scare me a little DW, hahaha.

 

[DWB]

It's interesting to see the plants continued to flower and set fruit throughout the miserable heat that has gone well over 100° (real temp-not feels like) many days. I'm surprised.

The worst pest of the year continues to be the birds. I have seen some army worm activity and need to spray with BT again but it's just been too stinkin hot to drag a hose through the garden and spray. Never mind that would require messing around with my carefully adjusted sprinkler settings I have to run those every week or so for a few cycles. 30 minutes on, 45 minutes off. Don't want the pump to overheat.

Note to self: Make a move and have the trencher guy come out with his machine, get off dead ass and lay that new, non pH adjusted water line then install the subsequent drip system promised to self for so many years now. The old system with 200' of ¾" hose works well but I can't feel comfortable feeding anything full-time and automatic with that. If a hose blows, the pump runs until the well loses prime. That would be a major PITA.

The plants are starting to produce well. Got this yesterday and a similar amount last weekend. Picture is with background of our lovely drought stricken centipede grass. More rain forecast for this weekend. I hope we actually get some this time. We've actually gotten 0.2" here in the last ~2 months. We get it good in our river valley sometimes. Sometimes not a drop while it pours nearby.

 

[DWB]

Survivor of the 5-day freak freeze we got for Christmas, Mama Reaper, is doing nicely. She is the only one of my long term plants that truly made it.

 

[DWB]

It will be interesting to see what prevails here. Gravity or the vine. These North Georgia Candy Roaster squash can get huge. I never let these things grow upward before.

We have an answer to this question. The vine lost.

 

[DWB]

I haven't seen one like this in a while.