• Blog your pepper progress. The first image in your first post will be used to represent your Glog.

Bigcedar 2019

[SIZE=11pt]Hi everyone! It’s been quite a few years since I’ve posted and after lurking around for the last couple months all excited about growing peppers again I decided it was time for a THP reunion :party:[/SIZE]  I’m happy to see a small handful of familiar faces still around and I’m Iooking forward to getting to know the rest of you guys and gals!
 
[SIZE=11pt]Quite a bit has changed in the last 6 years. Life was pretty crazy for awhile. The best news I feel like is that we are now homeowners on 5 acres. Left the rental in the city for a home in the country :) We lived in a trailer for 7 months while it was being built. It was one heck of an experience my family and I will never forget that’s for sure![/SIZE]
 
[SIZE=11pt]It’s been a full year since we got in our house. We absolutely love our house, we love living out in the country. Life is good. I spent last year planting stuff that takes a few years to produce well, an orchard, berries of all kinds, meadow flowers, and countless perennial flowers and trees. I swear I dug 3,000 holes last year. So this year it’s back to the important things, like growing chile peppers! I have some pretty intense ADHD like behaviors when it comes to hobbies. I’ve been borderline obsessed with quite a few in my days. I go big or go home and then I eventually get bored.. I find a new interest to obsess over and move on from the last. Growing peppers is the only hobby I’ve ever had that I always end up crawling back to. So here I am, growing some damn superhots again. A few months late, impulsive, but screw it, I’m going for it. A good 2 acres of the property is in full sun from sunup, to sundown and that’s double the direct sunlight that I’ve ever had in past grows, I’m okay with a game of catch up! [/SIZE]
 
N7c4nC9.jpg

 
[SIZE=11pt]Alright here we go.. Let the glog begin![/SIZE]
 
[SIZE=11pt]Well first off, during the big move I lost, or threw away my superhot seed collection... It was a good 300 variety + collection. I treated my house like I was the DEA and my seed collection was 50 kilos of Columbian snow. I looked in, under, over, and to the side of everything we own. Nothing. Absolutely nothing. Man that was hard to swallow! No reason to dwell though, time to start over. I’ve been out of the game so long that I’d never heard of White Hot Peppers but they had some cool varieties that I’ve never seen and I read some good things here. I cannot say enough good things myself. Super fast shipping, quality seeds and tons of freebies I wanted to buy but restrained myself from! I felt like a little kid at Christmas time opening up that package. Thanks alot WHP![/SIZE]
 
qiNRlwL.jpg

 
[SIZE=11pt]Time to plant some seeds! I normally would have liked to have these in dirt by the end of February at the latest. Well that time has past, better late than never. Planted 4.10 My plan is to OW anything I feel is worth it, I think I have room for 40-60 overwinters, so even if I don’t get pods of these, I’ll be completely okay with a large plant that I can OW that will kill it next year. I did cheat a little bit as well and have some plants coming any day from cross country nurseries :shh:[/SIZE]  (just in case I lose this game of catch up! It's my pod insurance policy!!)
 
NGBGGeR.jpg

 
gzKILfV.jpg

 
Typical rainy April day in Western Washington!
 
wLfuUbo.jpg

 
 
[SIZE=11pt]Another issue, I sold all of my HOT5’s, MH’s, HPS’s, and seed heating mats back in the "holy shit we need more money!" moving days. Living out in the country has a way of teaching you how to jerry-rig so with that said...  How do I heat up these seeds without spending money.. Rubbermaid, old pots, old flats, a reptile heating mat, a baby chick heat lamp, lid, reptile thermostat and…. Walaa! [/SIZE]
 
muZumTw.jpg

 
af05Obe.jpg

 
Yep.... that'll work!
 
It's pretty ghetto I know and a lot different than using all the fancy equipment that I've gotten use to over the years but it'll do I think!
 
Should be seeing sprouts soon, CCN plants are coming in any day and I do have a few nursery bought plants I'm testing some new soil out with right now while using my aquarium plant LED light  :lol:
 
I have a bad habit of overfilling my time plate if you will, and back in 2016 I did just that. I thought it would be a great idea to grow again even with all of life's other things going on at the time. I embarked on my largest superhot grow to date after taking 3 years off.. Well, I barely had time to sleep that year, seriously.. But! I did accomplish my biggest and best grow yet! It was flawless from start to finish. I was pretty damn proud of it! All the while wishing I had time to post about it here on THP and that time was definitely not there. So, with that said I have to just share a few pics from that grow.. It was pretty nuts, I ended up having to move right as the major harvesting was going on and intense processing was about to start. I barely got to enjoy any of the peppers, lost most of it due to needing to find a new home and fast but that was totally okay, I had a ton of fun that year, I proved myself to myself that year. It was good!  :)
 
July 2016
 
XhexB8N.jpg

 
My daughter jumping so I could see where she was at  :lol:
August..
 
ZL8VJql.jpg

 
September..
 
R0OFx4U.jpg

 
and.. October.
 
H5j34hj.jpg

 
DU82xV0.jpg

 
XMUlyzU.jpg

 
:cool:
 
Well, it's good to be back! I gotta start meeting new chile people and checking out all these glogs! Til next time!
Brandon
 
 
 
 
 
 
Looking forward to any input and thoughts on the matter! Couple other spotlights...
 
TSM Yellow rockin some big ol leaves
 
qRe251G.jpg

 
Devils Nagabrains Red 
 
o4MbKo4.jpg

 
You can spot all 3 of my Leviathan Scorpions out of the group from a mile away, very distinct pointy leaves.
 
3oUzjet.jpg

 
Couple randoms..
 
Blues coming on
 
kqbNZco.jpg

 
And another cool frog!
 
A7HUQi4.jpg
 
Great to see the update on how things are going!  You aren't kidding about the local growth stall.  Seems to be hitting my scotch bonnets worst of all.  Heck, we hit 80F in mid-March and had < 50F's and hail within the last few days.  The big weather swings just don't seem to give the chilies a chance to settle in and do their thing. 
 
I think a hoop house would be a big plus for you. I struggle some because it's not located at my house so I can't adjust it daily if/as needed, but it still helps with hardening off and adds length to my season on both ends.  It's easy to set up and then take down when not needed and you can adjust it from fully enclosed for temps all the way to an open ended tunnel to simply keep the rain off the plants and protect them from wind damage. I don't mind losing those big low leaves at all though. I figure they always get beat up and being down touching the soil or in the "splash zone" they make the plant more susceptible to diseases and bugs and such. Plus once they're gone the sun can reach the low lateral growth nodes that much easier.
 
Your "late starts" look in great shape to produce this season - and I like that canopy shot of uniform healthy green leaves.  Blueberries looking good too!  I let mine get a little dry at the wrong time and they aren't looking nearly that plump. Glad things are doing good and hopefully our weather will be better from here on out.
 
BigCedar said:
I think the best news of the update is my late start seeds I threw in that I was planning on being some nice big OWs that wouldn't produce pods this year are catching up to the outdoor CCNs in a quick hurry! I'm 99.9999% sure as long as I don't have any disasters that I can get these 40 gallons to full maturity this season pods and all. I'm not taking them outside until mother nature can match my 86 degree and sunny growroom either! You can see the back and left side are the 40 gallons and in front of them are 45 super late starts that I started a couple weeks back in 3.5 pots... Now I'm wondering if I can get them to full maturity..... Ok now I'm just talking non sense!
 
P4koFhu.jpg

 
Love me a canopy shot!
 
4Epg63j.jpg

 
So here is my version of Shanes "Twilight Zone" plant.... I don't have a cool name for it yet though, any ideas?  :think:
 
It's supposed to be a Brazilian Moruga Brown, I posted a picture of it in the last update because the early branching was quite abnormal to me, well it's grown up a bit since and now I'm convinced there is something really off about this plant. Maybe I'm an idiot and they're supposed to look like this but I have never seen a superhot personally or on the internet that looks like this so I have a hard time thinking that's the case but please, correct me if I'm wrong! 
 
GhYriys.jpg

 
KKNnEZI.jpg

 
I mean seriously... Totally weird freaking plant right?
 
It has a younger brother/sister as well that is also just as strange...
 
5XaOhfW.jpg
 
All those plants look great! Except the you know which ones :rolleyes:
 
I had a tomato plant go insane like that this year; I'm sure many would say it was a herbicide issue, but the 50+ around it look fine?? I filed that under shit happens.. :shh:
 
Edit: I hear ya about no time...I take pics and never post them!
 
 
CaneDog said:
Great to see the update on how things are going!  You aren't kidding about the local growth stall.  Seems to be hitting my scotch bonnets worst of all.  Heck, we hit 80F in mid-March and had < 50F's and hail within the last few days.  The big weather swings just don't seem to give the chilies a chance to settle in and do their thing. 
 
I think a hoop house would be a big plus for you. I struggle some because it's not located at my house so I can't adjust it daily if/as needed, but it still helps with hardening off and adds length to my season on both ends.  It's easy to set up and then take down when not needed and you can adjust it from fully enclosed for temps all the way to an open ended tunnel to simply keep the rain off the plants and protect them from wind damage. I don't mind losing those big low leaves at all though. I figure they always get beat up and being down touching the soil or in the "splash zone" they make the plant more susceptible to diseases and bugs and such. Plus once they're gone the sun can reach the low lateral growth nodes that much easier.
 
Your "late starts" look in great shape to produce this season - and I like that canopy shot of uniform healthy green leaves.  Blueberries looking good too!  I let mine get a little dry at the wrong time and they aren't looking nearly that plump. Glad things are doing good and hopefully our weather will be better from here on out.
 

Hopefully the crazy weather will pass. It's just under 100 here today and a cool front, in June mind you, here in the deep South is going to put us at 81° for a high tomorrow. That's like totally unheard of down here. Wish that would have hit Friday night after sweating like a pig this weekend..LOL
 
BigCedar said:
I think the best news of the update is my late start seeds I threw in that I was planning on being some nice big OWs that wouldn't produce pods this year are catching up to the outdoor CCNs in a quick hurry! I'm 99.9999% sure as long as I don't have any disasters that I can get these 40 gallons to full maturity this season pods and all. I'm not taking them outside until mother nature can match my 86 degree and sunny growroom either! You can see the back and left side are the 40 gallons and in front of them are 45 super late starts that I started a couple weeks back in 3.5 pots... Now I'm wondering if I can get them to full maturity..... Ok now I'm just talking non sense!
Impressive, brother!
 
 
Love me a canopy shot!
That's lush!
 
 
So here is my version of Shanes "Twilight Zone" plant.... I don't have a cool name for it yet though, any ideas?  :think:
 
It's supposed to be a Brazilian Moruga Brown, I posted a picture of it in the last update because the early branching was quite abnormal to me, well it's grown up a bit since and now I'm convinced there is something really off about this plant. Maybe I'm an idiot and they're supposed to look like this but I have never seen a superhot personally or on the internet that looks like this so I have a hard time thinking that's the case but please, correct me if I'm wrong! 
 
 
 
It has a younger brother/sister as well that is also just as strange...
 
 
I don't think that is normal. Maybe a virus of some kind?
Sometimes they have strange effects on leaves. Like varigation.
 
At least that what a groundskeeper friend of mine told me. They
can also cause mutations that get passed on, I think.
 
BigCedar said:
DW! That is insanity!!! Did you catch that Rattler by yourself? Either way, I'm throwing some big time respect your way! That's nuts! Not many people would hold either of those. What kind was the first one? Man you got some serious snakes around your place that's really cool. If we see a little Gardener snake around here it's a big deal. I can't imagine seeing one of those hanging around!
 
 
Yes, I caught the rattler to save her life. Another picture and a little bit more about her found here.

http://thehotpepper.com/topic/70377-mattys-first-ever-glog-into-the-fire-2019-season/?p=1615053
 
Check out the diamondback Devv had outside his door. Same thread a bit later.
 
The other snake is an intergrade of Florida King to Chain King. I saved that one too. He was in the middle of an intersection. I stopped and walked up to him and offered my arm. He climbed straight up my arm and went in my shirt. Poor guy was scared half to death. Exceptional personality on that one. He went to Florida to join an educational program for young children.
 
The cat living to 26 is amazing. I didn't know a kitty could live to that age but nothing an animal does should surprise me. A neighbor has a horse that's 44 years old.
 
I'd cut those plants loose just in case the seeds had a virus of some sort. I had one variety do this about three years ago. looked exactly like that. They went in the garbage...not even the compost. All the others are looking awesome. I love that part of the grow. Didn't you at one point convert your garage into a grow room??? Maybe I just didn't read back far enough yet.
 
Devv said:
 
All those plants look great! Except the you know which ones :rolleyes:
 
I had a tomato plant go insane like that this year; I'm sure many would say it was a herbicide issue, but the 50+ around it look fine?? I filed that under shit happens.. :shh:
 
Edit: I hear ya about no time...I take pics and never post them!
 
 
Thank you Scott! I know man it's weird.. I'm gonna address it further with its weekly picture here shortly. I haven't found any answers on the matter yet. I know it's not herbicides so I can check that off the list.... We'll see what happens!
 
Devv said:
 
Hopefully the crazy weather will pass. It's just under 100 here today and a cool front, in June mind you, here in the deep South is going to put us at 81° for a high tomorrow. That's like totally unheard of down here. Wish that would have hit Friday night after sweating like a pig this weekend..LOL
 
That is crazy man! I can't even imagine. We had a 92 degree day this last week and it kicked my ass, the older I get the more the heat slows me down I'm noticing, I think it's more the humidity than anything, that good ol sticky heat. 
 
PaulG said:
 
I don't think that is normal. Maybe a virus of some kind?
Sometimes they have strange effects on leaves. Like varigation.
 
At least that what a groundskeeper friend of mine told me. They
can also cause mutations that get passed on, I think.
 
Thanks for stopping by Paul! I'll post my thoughts/findings on the mutant here shortly!
 
DWB said:
 
Yes, I caught the rattler to save her life. Another picture and a little bit more about her found here.
http://thehotpepper.com/topic/70377-mattys-first-ever-glog-into-the-fire-2019-season/?p=1615053
 
Check out the diamondback Devv had outside his door. Same thread a bit later.
 
The other snake is an intergrade of Florida King to Chain King. I saved that one too. He was in the middle of an intersection. I stopped and walked up to him and offered my arm. He climbed straight up my arm and went in my shirt. Poor guy was scared half to death. Exceptional personality on that one. He went to Florida to join an educational program for young children.
 
The cat living to 26 is amazing. I didn't know a kitty could live to that age but nothing an animal does should surprise me. A neighbor has a horse that's 44 years old.
 
Hey DW! I need to head over there to see that and also find out what the heck Matts been up to! I'm assuming Florida Kings eat other snakes like Cali Kings? They're really cool snakes! That is really cool of you to go out and save him like that, I had to share that story with my Wife! I would have loved to see that in person, poor guy he was one lucky snake to have you around that day, sounds like he's having a great new life. 44 year old horse  :shocked: that's nuts! We thought 26 was pretty incredible, I think at the time we looked up the world record and it was 24-25? We never did contact them about it but either way.. Pretty cool to know we had a record breaker. 
 
 
stc3248 said:
I'd cut those plants loose just in case the seeds had a virus of some sort. I had one variety do this about three years ago. looked exactly like that. They went in the garbage...not even the compost. All the others are looking awesome. I love that part of the grow. Didn't you at one point convert your garage into a grow room??? Maybe I just didn't read back far enough yet.
 
Hey Shane! Man after reading all your guy's thoughts on the matter I'm hoping my decision to keep it doesn't bite me in the ass! I would say the seedling to gallon stage is one of my favorite times right up there with pod up when you start finding out if you have the real deal or unexpected crosses  :)  I did convert my old garage into a grow room! Lol nice memory! I used it again for my 2016 big grow I pictured on page 1, worked out pretty damn good! I don't have a garage anymore now that we moved, traded a garage and small yard for acreage, fair trade for sure but I miss having a garage.. One day when the funds are right I'd love to build one, two for that matter! One for yard stuff and cars and another for peppers lol. 
 
stc3248 said:
Rosy Boas can grow to 48 inches...but rarely go beyond 36. This guy is maybe 30"...haven't measured him 
 
 
Thanks for the pics Shane! Your snake is beautiful! They look alot like the elusive Cascade Rubber Boas we have around here just quite a bit bigger.. How's the temperament? The Rubber Boas around here are said to be the gentlest of all snakes, wondering if Rosys are of the like.
 
CaneDog said:
Great to see the update on how things are going!  You aren't kidding about the local growth stall.  Seems to be hitting my scotch bonnets worst of all.  Heck, we hit 80F in mid-March and had < 50F's and hail within the last few days.  The big weather swings just don't seem to give the chilies a chance to settle in and do their thing. 
 
I think a hoop house would be a big plus for you. I struggle some because it's not located at my house so I can't adjust it daily if/as needed, but it still helps with hardening off and adds length to my season on both ends.  It's easy to set up and then take down when not needed and you can adjust it from fully enclosed for temps all the way to an open ended tunnel to simply keep the rain off the plants and protect them from wind damage. I don't mind losing those big low leaves at all though. I figure they always get beat up and being down touching the soil or in the "splash zone" they make the plant more susceptible to diseases and bugs and such. Plus once they're gone the sun can reach the low lateral growth nodes that much easier.
 
Your "late starts" look in great shape to produce this season - and I like that canopy shot of uniform healthy green leaves.  Blueberries looking good too!  I let mine get a little dry at the wrong time and they aren't looking nearly that plump. Glad things are doing good and hopefully our weather will be better from here on out.
 
I got done typing replies and thought... Wait a second I missed CDs!! 
 
Thanks for stopping by neighbor!! Good to hear your plants felt the stall too, whenever they come to a halt like that I KNOW in my mind its weather but then I start to wonder...  "Did I mess something up? What am I doing wrong here? I did everything just like last year! So.. I should be good.. right? It's gotta be weather... Right..? What if its not though?!" lol..  I've definitely noticed that the hotter the pepper the more they struggle with our climate so it makes sense your scotch was struggling. My Cayenne has been handling our spring the best by far, Fatalii and Caribbean 2nd place and the rest are all superhots and they're taking it the worst by a long shot. How did all the other crazy varieties your growing fair?  Ah don't answer that I need to head over to your glog I'll find out!! 
 
You've talked me into it! If you don't mind maybe I could ask you a few questions regarding the hoophouse, I've never messed with one or built one.. Where did you get yours? Did you build it? Any info would be awesome.. I bring in most of my plants come frost-thirty inside the house to ripen up all pods so I have the tail end of the season under wraps but I really wanna get them outdoors earlier in the spring without having to worry about the bipolar spring weather we get. I can see that having the main portion or your garden away from home would cause some issues, that's dedication right there I don't know how active I'd be in the gardening world if I had to drive to do it, hats off to you there! 
 
I'm with you on the big leaves. They always look good indoors and they're always the first to look like shit and drop after plant out for me. All my CCN's have dropped a good 75% of the "indoor" leaves they had once upon a time. Like you said, the branching takes over in a quick hurry and branching means more pods!
 
Finally got some good weather this week hopefully your plants liked it as much as mine did. And what do you know... were coolin off again just like that! lol. Seems to be temporary... We'll see!  
 
Hope all is well with you bud!
 
Weekly update!
 
We finally got some toasty weather this past week, hit 92 one day and we had a good 3 days in the 80s. The CCNs loved it and finally started to do some growin!
 
Literally almost every leaf/branch in the next few pics appeared over the course of the last week, you can definitely tell the difference between the weather beaten indoor leaves and the new outdoor growth.
 
Fatalii starting to come on strong
 
bN2YsqX.jpg

 
Douglah finally getting its grow on
 
0OsGRSU.jpg

 
Peach Bhut
 
TuKe5gf.jpg

 
7 Pot Original
 
Sl5u6vw.jpg

 
Captain Cayenne hasn't skipped a beat even with the majority of its outdoor life being sub par weather wise. As most of you know I wasn't even gonna keep this plant (test dummy) Well after seeing it fill out its 5 gallon already and loading down with pods I thought... Screw it. I'm going big! So I potted it up into a 20gallon yesterday. Side note, this plant has had some pretty goof amount of leaf cupping since day one, hasn't shown any signs of slowing down and or health problems and is throwing out pods like crazy so I'm ignoring but, it's definitely there! I've never grown in anything bigger than a 10 so I'm kind of excited to see what this baby can do!
 
Before...
 
2Pai9L9.jpg

 
After.
 
1PaYr5T.jpg

 
 
 
More to come... Just don't wanna get sent back to the home page so I'm breaking her up!
 
It got so hot over the last week that the indoor room hit 110+ with the light on... It was time. Late starts went outside to start the harden off process.
 
Hanging out in the dappled driveway
 
D8VTxNk.jpg

 
Along with the super lates
 
YRqscdK.jpg

 
Love how jewel green almost blue they are fresh out of the grow room!
 
zNI0nhu.jpg

 
Ok now on to the mutant!
 
mnRyYtn.jpg

 
So I've scoured the internet... viruses, mutations, herbicides... Nothing really stands out as a firm "That's it!" Everything on all the above is coupled with health problems, yellowing, leaf drop, contagious etc etc... This plant has no health problems outside of its distorted leaves and growth habit. It's perfectly healthy, it's growing, its not contagious by contact (if it is a virus) because it has been in full contact with almost all the other plants due to moving them around when watering and such.. The one thing I have yet to do, maybe Bhuter can help me out with is get in contact with WHP and hear his take on it, if he's seen it, had a plant it could have crossed with etc... Obviously it's traits or virus if so can be passed via cross pollination.. I'm aware of that but man... I just have a hard time not seeing this plant through judging by the fact it IS healthy and growing and not contagious.. I hope the decision doesn't bite me in the ass, I honestly don't think it will.. but I've been wrong... and I'm ok with dealing with the fallout if there is any to this decision. I have alot of space, and plan on keeping these 2 Brazilian ghosts acres away from the rest just incase, also if it is a virus that can transfer via soil... I grow in containers so I can cross that off the worry list as well.. Don't know if any of you watch "Stranger Things" on Netflix.. I'll be calling this plant "The Upside Down" from here on out lol.
 
 
 
 
Few random shots, heavy on bugs!
 
Caught my 1st and 2nd honeybee swarm this past week! One from one of my own hives that I hadn't boxed up quick enough, they split, and a wild one.  It was super cool and quite the experience I'll never forget.
 
K1ooYBw.jpg

 
Got honey?
 
js3B5Yd.jpg

 
bOPUWyU.jpg

 
Never a dull moment out here in the insect world.
 
LGlWLHA.jpg

 
GOIZ1mw.jpg

 
1XgdW6l.jpg

 
EzyDi0J.jpg

 
3GuqA2s.jpg

 
p5mBufL.jpg

 
 
That'll do it for this week! Thanks for stopping in everyone hope all is well!
 
 
 
BigCedar said:
Few random shots, heavy on bugs!
 
Caught my 1st and 2nd honeybee swarm this past week! One from one of my own hives that I hadn't boxed up quick enough, they split, and a wild one.  It was super cool and quite the experience I'll never forget.
 
K1ooYBw.jpg

 
Got honey?
 
js3B5Yd.jpg

 
bOPUWyU.jpg

 
Never a dull moment out here in the insect world.
 
LGlWLHA.jpg

 
GOIZ1mw.jpg

 
1XgdW6l.jpg

 
EzyDi0J.jpg

 
3GuqA2s.jpg

 
p5mBufL.jpg

 
 
That'll do it for this week! Thanks for stopping in everyone hope all is well!
 
 
Loving the pictures and the progress. Looking forward to the mutant “Upside Down” plant progress. How many bee hives do you have?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
Incredible pics, thanks for sharing! Those insects are incredible beautiful from those angles... Amazing progress on your end , happy to see all the plants are making their way out and you are fully primed for a killer season my friend. Knew this was going to be an enjoyable ride following your glog, and you've done nothing but exceed expectations! ;)

Sent from my ZTE A2017U using Tapatalk
 
BigCedar said:
 
I got done typing replies and thought... Wait a second I missed CDs!! 
 
Thanks for stopping by neighbor!! Good to hear your plants felt the stall too, whenever they come to a halt like that I KNOW in my mind its weather but then I start to wonder...  "Did I mess something up? What am I doing wrong here? I did everything just like last year! So.. I should be good.. right? It's gotta be weather... Right..? What if its not though?!" lol..  I've definitely noticed that the hotter the pepper the more they struggle with our climate so it makes sense your scotch was struggling. My Cayenne has been handling our spring the best by far, Fatalii and Caribbean 2nd place and the rest are all superhots and they're taking it the worst by a long shot. How did all the other crazy varieties your growing fair?  Ah don't answer that I need to head over to your glog I'll find out!! 
 
You've talked me into it! If you don't mind maybe I could ask you a few questions regarding the hoophouse, I've never messed with one or built one.. Where did you get yours? Did you build it? Any info would be awesome.. I bring in most of my plants come frost-thirty inside the house to ripen up all pods so I have the tail end of the season under wraps but I really wanna get them outdoors earlier in the spring without having to worry about the bipolar spring weather we get. I can see that having the main portion or your garden away from home would cause some issues, that's dedication right there I don't know how active I'd be in the gardening world if I had to drive to do it, hats off to you there! 
 
I'm with you on the big leaves. They always look good indoors and they're always the first to look like shit and drop after plant out for me. All my CCN's have dropped a good 75% of the "indoor" leaves they had once upon a time. Like you said, the branching takes over in a quick hurry and branching means more pods!
 
Finally got some good weather this week hopefully your plants liked it as much as mine did. And what do you know... were coolin off again just like that! lol. Seems to be temporary... We'll see!  
 
Hope all is well with you bud!
 
Was out working at the plots most of the day today and it looks like the scotch bonnets are coming out of the stall and starting to put on some better new growth.  Glad to see that - it's about time!
 
So yeah, the hoop houses.  The ones I have now were given to me and are prefab metal tube in arcs that fit over rebar driven into the ground ever few feet. The kits came with standard sheet plastic and plastic snap-on clips to hold it on. What I've done in the past is use rebar the same way and slipped PVC over the rebar and arced it over and anchored it the same way on the other side. Then I just draped the plastic over and weighted it on the sides and ends.   If I were to do it again I might try to make clips using PVC too. Thinking I could cut it into 3" sections and then Dremel or hacksaw cut a 1/3" +/- piece out turning each 3" section from an O into a C. Then the C would kinda snap over the arcs of PVC like this ( C => O) and hold the plastic on. That's basically how the clips in the kit work. I'm not sure how well that would work with PVC, but I'm sure there's lots of ways to hold the plastic on and even just weighting it down along the outside worked OK before.
 
As far as using the houses, there's lots of versatility.  I'll put gallon jugs of water and even 5g Home Depot type buckets of water under the HH as overnight thermal mass and totally close the plastic when it's chilly.  When it gets warmer you can play around with one or both ends open partially or fully. Another trick on those hot early days is to fold the plastic up and back halfway the long side facing south (rather than just the ends which I align east/west) and give the plants full sun exposure. It's a lot easier to do that and just slide the plastic back at night or after the warm period's over than removing it fully and putting it back on.  Really a lot of flexibility once you play around with them for a while.  And in the fall anything in a bucket I want to keep out of the rain and cold to ripen I just stuff under a HH and it keeps the season going a bit longer. Still, at some point even before the frost they just seem to stop ripening and need to come inside to finish up.
 
Hope that helps some with ideas and that it works out for you.
 
CaneDog said:
 
Was out working at the plots most of the day today and it looks like the scotch bonnets are coming out of the stall and starting to put on some better new growth.  Glad to see that - it's about time!
 
So yeah, the hoop houses.  The ones I have now were given to me and are prefab metal tube in arcs that fit over rebar driven into the ground ever few feet. The kits came with standard sheet plastic and plastic snap-on clips to hold it on. What I've done in the past is use rebar the same way and slipped PVC over the rebar and arced it over and anchored it the same way on the other side. Then I just draped the plastic over and weighted it on the sides and ends.   If I were to do it again I might try to make clips using PVC too. Thinking I could cut it into 3" sections and then Dremel or hacksaw cut a 1/3" +/- piece out turning each 3" section from an O into a C. Then the C would kinda snap over the arcs of PVC like this ( C => O) and hold the plastic on. That's basically how the clips in the kit work. I'm not sure how well that would work with PVC, but I'm sure there's lots of ways to hold the plastic on and even just weighting it down along the outside worked OK before.
 
As far as using the houses, there's lots of versatility.  I'll put gallon jugs of water and even 5g Home Depot type buckets of water under the HH as overnight thermal mass and totally close the plastic when it's chilly.  When it gets warmer you can play around with one or both ends open partially or fully. Another trick on those hot early days is to fold the plastic up and back halfway the long side facing south (rather than just the ends which I align east/west) and give the plants full sun exposure. It's a lot easier to do that and just slide the plastic back at night or after the warm period's over than removing it fully and putting it back on.  Really a lot of flexibility once you play around with them for a while.  And in the fall anything in a bucket I want to keep out of the rain and cold to ripen I just stuff under a HH and it keeps the season going a bit longer. Still, at some point even before the frost they just seem to stop ripening and need to come inside to finish up.
 
Hope that helps some with ideas and that it works out for you.
 
Great info CD. Do you like ½" or ¾" pvc? Good idea for the pvc clips to hold the plastic. I think I'm gonna make some sort of hoop house for next winter to extend production. I plan to do some more seed starts and clones soon for that project.
 
 
DWB said:
 
Great info CD. Do you like ½" or ¾" pvc? Good idea for the pvc clips to hold the plastic. I think I'm gonna make some sort of hoop house for next winter to extend production. I plan to do some more seed starts and clones soon for that project.
 
 
The ones I've done in the past have been smaller (covering 30" +/- width beds for early season plants) and I'm pretty sure I used 1/2" and 1/4" rebar..  If I were going to go bigger, like my current kit size of 60" width beds, I'd probably be looking at 3/4". If the arc is too tight for the diameter of the PVC, it might have to be heat-shaped to avoid folding/breaking.  I suppose the easiest thing is to go into the store and give the PVC a bend toward the desired shape and see how it responds. 
 
I've never used a frame, but if I were to go big enough I'd start thinking about using lumber and L-braces to build a rectangular foundation and mountain the PVC in some fashion to the base due to a larger structure taking more force from wind. But that's getting into a more significant structure and I've only done the easy-up, easy-down type.
 
I'm actually considering building a small similar structure now with Tulle netting solely for the purposes of plant isolation for seeds. I've been thinking I could put different varieties of pepper in that structure and still maintain a much lower risk of hybridization due to excluding most pollinating insects.
 
Back
Top