BeagleStorm vs 2011 - My Chile Grow Log

Ok first up is some photos of my over wintered plants. Scorpion, Naga Morich, Chocolate Bhut, and 2 x Harold St. Barts. More of an experiment... I have never tried to over winter plants before. Did not super prune the plants or the root balls. I just left them in their pots out in the semi-cold during early November and most of the leaves started falling off. Then I did a minimal prune to remove any remaining leaves and to clean them up a bit. Gave them a cup of water each and threw them in my parent’s garage. I gave them a second cup of water last weekend. They seem to be doing great. One plant had what seemed to be a few Aphids so I sprayed it with Organocide but they have been bug free for the last month. I want to keep them in pots, so I think I will need to transplant them into fresh soil and maybe bigger pots this spring. Just not sure how I am going to do it or what process I am going to use. I do know that I am going to keep them at my parents so they do not pass any nasty critters to my seedlings before spring comes. Any recommendations?

 

[Alphaeon]

running out of space here too! Though on a lesser scale Time to trim the crop of smaller ones... that will be hard.

 

[Beaglestorm]

great looking plants. how long until you can put them outside. i'm concerned that mine are also going to get too big before i can move them outside.

80'S and nice all week then back down to 39 degrees on Thursday night. I am close, originally I had figured mid April but… now way I can last that long. What is killing me is I have my plants outside right now. Occasional wind gusts up to 20 have already clipped several plants. I am running out of chop sticks to hold them up. LOL Forecast is for 20-40 MPH winds every day this week. Makes it so hard to harden your plants with out a green house. Is it possible to harden your plants through a window? Hoping to get my hoops up on the raised beds then I will risk it next weekend or at the latest week after next.

Beagle, Fabulous plants and great raised beds! Congratulations

Mike

Thanks Capsidadburn

Looking good Mike. I am still surprised every season at how fast the room in my grow box is filled. I still have to hold out until mid May.

I think I recall you saying you were going to paint your raised beds blue. If so, what kind of blue? Royal, sky, etc.? Just thinking in terms of your hot weather. Do you think maybe a light tan would be better in your hot climate?

Yes, that is my struggle! What will look the best vs. what is the most practical and functional for the plants. If I have to go light I am considering silver or light gray. The other option is making the shade structure hang over a bit to shade the steel as well. (At least on the South side with out tre shae) One thing I am still having an issue with is my trees will shade probably 50% of the planters. Not sure if they will shade too much once all the leaves come in. I could cut the branches off so I can have a more controlled shade but I think for this season I will see what happens. I am planning to put one of everything I am growing in the full sun and one under the tree shade. That way I can see which like what. Here is a pic:

Ahhh. Yeah, Houston, we have a problem.

Exactly! LOL

Beautiful work Michael, plants look fantastic. I've got a couple my plants that are stubby with real tight nodes too.

I feel Josh's pain, I'm running out of room too, but fortunately I'll be potting them up outside next weekend.

We have had snow in April but it is very unlikely. More likely is 100 degrees starting in early May.

Congratulations you have plants in perfect health

Thanks Mascalzone!

 

[Beaglestorm]

running out of space here too! Though on a lesser scale Time to trim the crop of smaller ones... that will be hard.

I have 25-30 plants I need to give away or murder... I am already getting sentimental.

 

[Beaglestorm]

One last thing... I need to add to the "Things I have learned in 2011"

When you have say 28 pots in a tray and the plants are all crowded and growing together they will grow fine every though they are a bit crowded. You can even take the plants out of the trays for a few minutes to water them then carefully put them back in the tray when your finished.

Under no circumstances however should you remove the plants from the tray, water them then not put them immediately back in their trays because you are in a hurry and have to be gone all day. If you DO do this the plants will spread out, extend their leaves and basically expand like a wet sponge and take 6 times the area they took mere hours earlier. Granted they will look great and you will be happy to see that the plants were not permanently affected by their sweatshop living conditions but that happiness will quickly fade as you relive a scene from the movie Jumangi. LOL

 

[patrick]

Holy cow Michael! My freaking face is aching due to all the grinning I'm doing. I couldn't be happier for you bro. If you told folks this was your first year of growing peppers they wouldn't believe you. You blew right past rookie grower to consummate professional. Your plants look freaking FABULOUS!! You decide to write a book on growing chillies put me down for two. Damn!

Oh yeah I thought it was hilarious that your wife moved the fan but didn't point it at the plants. That is a classic man. I know she told you to leave better instructions next time. Or didn't you have the nerve to say something about it to her?

Keep up the great work buddy.

 

[Beaglestorm]

Holy cow Michael! My freaking face is aching due to all the grinning I'm doing. I couldn't be happier for you bro. If you told folks this was your first year of growing peppers they wouldn't believe you. You blew right past rookie grower to consummate professional. Your plants look freaking FABULOUS!! You decide to write a book on growing chillies put me down for two. Damn!

Oh yeah I thought it was hilarious that your wife moved the fan but didn't point it at the plants. That is a classic man. I know she told you to leave better instructions next time. Or didn't you have the nerve to say something about it to her?

Keep up the great work buddy.

Thanks Patrick... it is my only hobby now since my other two are not kid friendly. Another 2 or 3 years and my boys will be big enough to do some of the other things I enjoy. (Target Shooting, Skiing, Camping, etc.) This chile thing really is an exhausting passion compared to the other hobbies I have had in the past. Seeing everybody’s amazing grow logs really keep you motivated to perform and not give up. Regardless, I am really dreading having to plant out 110+ plants. If all goes well growing in the raised bed this season, next year I hope to drop growing in containers all together. 60 -70 plants sounds a lot more manageable and enjoyable.

Should have a few more funny/horror stories by the end of the month... I put my wife in charge of hardening my plants this week. LOL She already called me from the grocery store today and when I asked her if she had brought in my plants before it got windy she said “uhhhh. Oh yea I forgot about them… I will be home in a little while.”

Hey how are your AISPES plants doing.. let's see some pics. The Chocolate Scorpions are really growing wild. For some reason the v2 have much bigger leaves than v1 even though they are from the same seed. My TS Yellow Morouga's are looking the smallest. The tigers are growing leggy but healthy no matter what I seem to do with them.

Looks like I am not going to plant out this weekend as scheduled. They are forecasting 55 MPH winds for the weekend. At least this whole week the wind has been manageable to allow my plants time to get hardened. Instead of waiting till the following weekend, I think I will just start planting out a dozen or so each night after work instead of trying to get them all transplanted in one day.

 

[Beaglestorm]

Had these rolling dollys we made leftover from a job we just finished. They were used to move around 10-12-16 FT Bulletin boards. They are now going to be used for hardening, holding and shuttling my container plants around the yard. Upper cross bar should make it easy to lay some shade cloth over them protect from wind.

 

[cmpman1974]

Screw the plants...I'll take the kitchen please. Beautiful granite!!

Chris

 

[patrick]

That looks like a really useful set of wheels man. Best of luck with the wife and her hardening off duties. Sunburned plants can recover and go on to grow lots and lots of peppers.

 

[Beaglestorm]

Screw the plants...I'll take the kitchen please. Beautiful granite!!
Chris

Thanks Chris, Thanks to the internet you can now shop the entire US for slabs of granite. Was able to look at the actual inventory photos of all the slabs at over 39 slab yards across the US. Then when you see a slab you like you can ask for detail photos to be sent to you and if you like them have the slabs tagged and shipped to your local slab yard. We fell in love with some we saw at the Las Vegas yard and bought it almost a year before we started renovating the house.

That looks like a really useful set of wheels man. Best of luck with the wife and her hardening off duties. Sunburned plants can recover and go on to grow lots and lots of peppers.

LOL... see folowing pictures...

 

[Beaglestorm]

Had a tray with some of my best plants on them with lots of space between them to give them lots of room..... There will be a candlelight vigil at midnight tonight to remember my Orange 7. He leaves behind a beautiful wife and an infant. I will be giving special care to them to make sure their family name lives on. My wife says he was killed in some form of construction moving accident falling to his death onto the concrete floor below.

I have also noticed that my Chocolate Habalokia plants drink a lot of water. Found three of them wilted and droopy when I got home today. None of my other plants were suffering any ill effects of hardening. I will have to see if that continues when they get planted in the ground. It will be hard to give them special care in a big raised bed. I think I am going to plant them in the shady side of my garden just to be safe. Going to plants out 30 or so containers this weekend. They are still forecasting 55 MPH winds for the weekend so nothing in the ground till Tuesday after the dust storms.

 

[Beaglestorm]

Ahhh... another glorious weekend coming up to do some planting out in the garden.

 

[thatguy]

I feel your pain, I'm so sick of this wind.

 

[Dot Com]

I have 25-30 plants I need to give away or murder... I am already getting sentimental.

I know the feeling. When I started growing last season i wanted everything to grow until I had 7 of 1 variety and only 1 or 2 of newer seedlings. Now I have to occasionally do some culling of the more numerous plants to make room for other varieties (I'm not a commercial grower so 3+/- of one variety is plenty for me.

 

[Dot Com]

Ahhh... another glorious weekend coming up to do some planting out in the garden.

Wow. Thos eSanta Ana winds? I used to live in San Diego, thats why I ask. I heard about them if those are they.

 

[Silver_Surfer]

Your plants are doing fantastic!

Here's to a bountiful harvest.

 

[Beaglestorm]

updating this from my phone. computer has been down all week with a virus. Finally got some plants in the ground this morning. Have a nice outlook for the weekend weather as well. Got 20 plants in the ground, family is in town so no more planting til sunday night. Got 7's and scorpions planted in the shady part. I'm going to put some in the sunny part as well. Here are some pics

 

[logchief]

Wow Michael, you got some great plants going on there. Those raised beds you've been working on look like you're gonna have a pepper jungle there. I use a similar watering system in my raised bed and pots with those risers and spiders. Also I love that kitchen of yours.

We've sent some of our dozers, engines and overhead personnel to TX for the fires there. Right now about 160 folks.

 

[capsidadburn]

Great looking plants there Beaglestorm! Love your beds you made too.

Good Luck with your season.

Mike

 

[buddy]

beagle - great start, great plants, great set-up. you're going to be swimming in chiles this year.