Blorvak's Greenhorn 2014 - End of Season Wrap Up!

blorvak · Jul 6, 2014

Nulle said:
bump

Hey, thanks! Moving a bit slow after last night's celebrations, so of course I'm late with the pics!

So, the Mako Akokosrade has for sure set pods! My second Chinense to do so. It's finally bulking out:

And here's my accidentally topped Orange Hab. It's hasn't really grown much, but is setting few flowers. So far, my experiments in accidental topping aren't promising:

And I spent the day transitioning the garden into Summer Mode. Harvested some crops I planted last fall. First up, some elephant garlic:

And regular garlic:

This is kinda wild... it looks like one of the garlic plants grew cloves in the middle of the stem. Haven't seen this before:

Shallots, and a few potatoes. Wish the shallots had gotten a little bigger, but it's all good:

And of course, it was way too nice to let the grill sit idle. Tri tip and corn on the cob:

Mixed up a giant batch of fish juice and fertilized the tomatoes and peppers while I was grilling. Hope everyone is having a good weekend! Thanks for reading!

Runescape · Jul 6, 2014

Lol, thats one funky garlic... were there cloves at the bottom as well?

Awesome food pics...

blorvak · Jul 12, 2014

Runescape said:
Lol, thats one funky garlic... were there cloves at the bottom as well?

Awesome food pics...

Yes, it had a big bulb on the bottom! I might save a clove and see if I can get it to do it again.

A week of warm weather really has done some good in the garden. The forecast keeps warning that we might hit triple digits, but never gets that far. Portland gets an average of 12 days of 90+ weather a year, and we're looking at a stretch of 7-8 here in the 92 range. Not bad! Makes for miserable sleeping, but great pepper growing.

As such, I've got a stack of pics to show some results. Finally!

First off, a Yellow Rocoto pod!:

Wasn't expecting pods this year! A half dozen or so have set, and the plant is still flowering:

The 7 Pot Yellow finally set pods!:

It's been dropping flowers for months, but evidently it's either time for pods, or it's loving the heat, or both:

And what's this? First tomato of the season is turning red:

And speaking of getting ripe, the Alma Paprika are getting a blush of red as well:

And here's my ugly duckling of the season: the Tunisian Baklouti. Pod looks good, right?

But that's all it's got! This was my biggest plant in solo cup days, and now it's mostly a stick with one pod.

Like my peppers last year. Dunno what it's problem is.

Another Chinense that's doing well is the Mako akokosrade.

Really filling out as a plant, and setting some flowers:

And that's 10! Bump if ya want to see more!

Runescape · Jul 12, 2014

Bump, neat pod pics...

blorvak · Jul 12, 2014

Runescape said:
Bump, neat pod pics...

Thanks much!

My Purple Cayenne is setting tons of pods that all look a bit like this:

I'm already doing better than last year, when I harvested a grand total of 3 (count 'em, 3!) cayenne pods:

And the Goat's Weed is just chugging along:

Will grow more of these guys next year!:

The Trinidad Cola Bean has larger pods than the Gold variant:

It's beefing up as well:

And that's all I got! Here's to hoping the temps stick in the sweet spot. Hope everyone's having a good weekend, and thanks for watching!

blorvak · Jul 16, 2014

First peppers of the season!

I hesitate to call it a "pull". In fact, I threw in my first tomato and some squash so the peppers didn't feel lonely. We have a Goat's Weed, a super tiny Trinidad Gold Bean, and a kinda wrinkled Black Hungarian:

I was waiting for the Black Hungarian to turn red, but it turned deep burgundy instead. Might just let it dry out, and harvest the seeds.

Saving the Goat's Weed. Going to try the Trinidad Gold bean!

This baby's all of a centimeter long! Looks like I won't be harvesting seeds from this baby:

Thought this might have heat, but probably not superhot heat. So I dove in. So little to sample, all I got was a bit of sweet, a bit of citrus, and some heat! Not bad! Here's to hoping I get some bigger ones! Maybe even ones with seeds in them.

blorvak · Jul 19, 2014

More pod sampling!

Tried the first Goat's Weed. Split it in half without damaging any seeds, somehow. Lucky!

After harvesting the seeds, I chopped the pod into slivers to add to a taco salad I had for dinner. Sampled about a centimeter. This baby packed some heat! Now, I know I don't have the tolerance that most of you have, but this was some respectable heat. Flavor-wise, it was a bit savory. Not sweet at all. You could tell when you got a sliver in a bite of salad. Thinking these may be good as powder.

Today, I picked some Alma Paprika:

Expected these to be sweeter than they were. A bit of sweet, but also the heavy, earthy quality that you find in paprikas. Happened to be making some schwarma, so I threw them on the grill:

I liked 'em on the grill. My wife did not... she thought they needed a dressing. A bit intense by themselves. Could easily see why people pickle these. Hope to do so myself if not this year, then next year.

That's all I got! Happy Friday everyone!

Roguejim · Jul 19, 2014

I'm glad to see your yellow 7-pot is just as ugly as mine! I thought something was wrong with mine, but, I guess that is how they are supposed to look. Hopefully, the flavor will shine. I'm looking for a 7-pot that will do well in a pepper sauce.

blorvak · Jul 19, 2014

Roguejim said:
I'm glad to see your yellow 7-pot is just as ugly as mine! I thought something was wrong with mine, but, I guess that is how they are supposed to look. Hopefully, the flavor will shine. I'm looking for a 7-pot that will do well in a pepper sauce.

Yep, it's only getting uglier!:

The 7 pot set a ton of fruit all at the same time after the first pod. I'll just say this... I'm a bit intimidated. Found a baby stink bug on that pod, and a leaf with an egg cluster on it. Eliminated it with extreme prejudice.

So, weather has settled back into the mid 80's this week, and I have pods on ALMOST everyone. Underachievers are my scotch bonnets, my mystery "rocoto", and my orange hab.

But let's hear it for the Purple Cayenne, who is loaded with pods!:

The Black Hungarian is rallying as well:

Have some red hiding in the middle of the Goat's Weed:

So, my Aji Habanero plant has been wan, and yellowish most of it's life. It's greened up a bit, but never really exploded with growth. But impressive poddage for a little guy!:

My first CGN 21500 pod! I have a feeling this isn't going to be a heavy producer

My sad, topped Orange Habanero. Your seed description said that you were a vigorous grower with production that bordered on super-plant-ian. I planted you as a confidence booster, in case my other plants all fizzled out, even though you weren't the most exciting of peppers. Not a pod on ya:

Joe E. Parker, the only pepper not in the main pepper bed. Only one pod. It's a big pod! Starting to turn. And new flowers coming:

And it's been a while since we've seen some garden shots. Here's a pic of the raised bed with peppers:

And the ones in root pouches:

That's ten! Going back to read about all the fantastic pulls that you all have on yer glogs.

LowDrag · Jul 19, 2014

I have a couple of questions for you neighbor...

1. Why the black plastic? Does that help keep your soil moist or keep the cats out?

2. Did you let your peppers grow to about a foot tall and then top them just below the "Y"? I topped mine too soon I think and stunted their growth on some of them. The Bell peppers and the supposed Jalapeno's that aren't Jalapeno's are nice and tall. Each one is pushing about two feet tall so far but most of the others are still quite short. Not at all like your plants.

3. What is the orange plastic in some of your pic's? What do you use it for?

4. How much fish fertilizer do you put on your plants? I went to Home Depot and got some today to use on my garden. The directions say to use 1 tablespoon per gallon of water but how much do you put on your plants at one time?

Your garden looks great! I am going to do raised beds next year too. I gave some starts to my daughter-in-law and her plants are WAY bigger than mine are... :shocked:

I am going to let my peppers die out this time and then next year I am going to start new ones. I will be better prepared for next season thanks THP and all the great advice/experience I am reading here.

Dave

blorvak · Jul 20, 2014

LowDrag said:
I have a couple of questions for you neighbor...

1. Why the black plastic? Does that help keep your soil moist or keep the cats out?

2. Did you let your peppers grow to about a foot tall and then top them just below the "Y"? I topped mine too soon I think and stunted their growth on some of them. The Bell peppers and the supposed Jalapeno's that aren't Jalapeno's are nice and tall. Each one is pushing about two feet tall so far but most of the others are still quite short. Not at all like your plants.

3. What is the orange plastic in some of your pic's? What do you use it for?

4. How much fish fertilizer do you put on your plants? I went to Home Depot and got some today to use on my garden. The directions say to use 1 tablespoon per gallon of water but how much do you put on your plants at one time?

Your garden looks great! I am going to do raised beds next year too. I gave some starts to my daughter-in-law and her plants are WAY bigger than mine are... I am going to let my peppers die out this time and then next year I am going to start new ones. I will be better prepared for next season thanks THP and all the great advice/experience I am reading here.

Dave

I got answers!

So, the black plastic mulch is for several reasons. It keeps the soil and root area warmer in our northern climate, it keeps the cats from using it as a litter box, keeps the weeding down to a minimum, and it helps with water retention. I water about every 3 days with a soaker hose that I installed under the plastic. I started using the mulch last year, and quite like it. I probably like it best for the weed prevention part.

As for topping, I was going to run some experiments, but ended up with one of each variety of plant, so I couldn't do any side by side tests. So I haven't topped any of my plants. Well, my orange hab was topped accidentally when the wind blew it's solo cup over. It never recovered, so I'm not too excited to try more topping.

The orange netting is cat mulch. I only have one fat cat, but every cat in the neighborhood likes to chill in my backyard. Any freshly turned soil is automatically a prime litter box location. Not only is it gross, but they'll dig up all my seeds/seedlings. So after I prepare an area, I'll lay down the orange netting so they can't go digging. You'll notice lots of collapsed tomato cages set over my raised beds for the same purpose.

As for fish juice, I bought the hydrolysate from Kelp4Less. Use the same concentration as you, and then water as I would usually water the plant. It's inexact at best, but the NPK of the fish hydrolysate is so low, that it's difficult to burn the plants.

Why don't you try overwintering a plant or two? I'm going to try that for the first time this year. It doesn't seem that hard, and looks to get ya a big jump on the next year!

LowDrag · Jul 21, 2014

blorvak said:
I got answers!

So, the black plastic mulch is for several reasons. It keeps the soil and root area warmer in our northern climate, it keeps the cats from using it as a litter box, keeps the weeding down to a minimum, and it helps with water retention. I water about every 3 days with a soaker hose that I installed under the plastic. I started using the mulch last year, and quite like it. I probably like it best for the weed prevention part.

You have called the plastic, "plastic mulch". It is still just like 4 mil plastic right?

As for topping, I was going to run some experiments, but ended up with one of each variety of plant, so I couldn't do any side by side tests. So I haven't topped any of my plants. Well, my orange hab was topped accidentally when the wind blew it's solo cup over. It never recovered, so I'm not too excited to try more topping.

I think I topped some of my peppers too soon. My Bells took off real nice but my Banana's, Serrano's, Mystery's, Ghost and Trinidad Scorpion are all still pretty short.

The orange netting is cat mulch. I only have one fat cat, but every cat in the neighborhood likes to chill in my backyard. Any freshly turned soil is automatically a prime litter box location. Not only is it gross, but they'll dig up all my seeds/seedlings. So after I prepare an area, I'll lay down the orange netting so they can't go digging. You'll notice lots of collapsed tomato cages set over my raised beds for the same purpose.

So they won't even try to dig through the orange plastic huh? Interesting.

As for fish juice, I bought the hydrolysate from Kelp4Less. Use the same concentration as you, and then water as I would usually water the plant. It's inexact at best, but the NPK of the fish hydrolysate is so low, that it's difficult to burn the plants.

I'll check out Kelp4less. Is that online or local?

Why don't you try overwintering a plant or two? I'm going to try that for the first time this year. It doesn't seem that hard, and looks to get ya a big jump on the next year!

If my Ghost Pepper, Habanero's and Trinidad Scorpion get some size to them I will otherwise I will start over next year in January. My other peppers I can start from scratch pretty easy.

Thanks!!!

blorvak · Jul 26, 2014

In typical Portland fashion, the temps took a nose dive this week. Had some thunderstorms, cool winds, and boring old rain. And just like that, it's gone, and we're back to mid 80's to low 90's this coming week. An exceptional summer so far, all things considered.

Peppers are the 'slow and steady' plant in the garden. There's no rushing 'em. But the good news is that everyone has pods, except my red Scotch Bonnet. I'm beginning to think I'm going to have to grow two of each variety to ensure I don't get dud plants. Some individuals just don't grow to their potential.

Speaking of pods...

The Aji Limon finally set several, and they're growing rapidly. Hope this means it'll load up!:

Same story for the White Bullet Hab. It's been smallish and dropping flowers forever, but it finally had a mind to set them, and the pods are growing rapidly:

The pequin is one of the slowest, and steadiest growers. Has pods all over it now, and they're a bit bigger than I expected:

The Yellow 7 Pot is one of my most prolific peppers right now. I like heat, but I'm not like most of you guys who pop super pods like candy. I'm interested to see if they get as hot in our climate:

I have two Mako Akokosrade, one in a 7 gal pot, and one in a 3, and both are setting a bunch of pods. Read in other glogs that these haven't been the most prolific for folks, but they seem to like it in the NW.

Yellow Rocoto is still flowering, and setting pods. Very impressed with this plant. Some of the pods are golf ball sized, which is I think about as big as they'll get. I could be wrong:

Goat's Weed has had 3 ripe pods so far. I'm hoping that I get a wave to harvest now that the weather has warmed back up:

The Trinidad Gold Beans have finally started setting pods that are bigger than a pea:

Fish Pepper is loading up on the pods. None of them are varigated, but that's okay:

And I have a bunch of Black Hungarians that I'm waiting to get a wee bit bigger before harvesting. Or maybe they're ready now? Opinions?:

And that's the view from the pepper plot this week! Tomatoes are just starting to ripen. It's been a great year for cucumbers and squash, both of which I've had trouble growing in the past (I know... who has trouble growing squash?). Still can't get eggplants to be happy. Gonna have to do some research on that.

Hope your gardens are all doing well! Thanks for stopping by!

MeatHead1313 · Jul 26, 2014

Looking great blovark! I love seeing pods everywhere. If your yellow 7's are anything like mine, they'll be delicious, and HOT! If you can, wait til the black Hungarians turn red before harvesting. They have a much sweeter flavour when they're ripe.

blorvak · Jul 26, 2014

MeatHead1313 said:
Looking great blovark! I love seeing pods everywhere. If your yellow 7's are anything like mine, they'll be delicious, and HOT! If you can, wait til the black Hungarians turn red before harvesting. They have a much sweeter flavour when they're ripe.

Hey thanks!

I'll wait on the Black Hungarian peppers. It had one pod when I first planted it out, and I waited for that one to turn red, but it kinda turned deep maroon and then dried out. I'll keep a better eye on them this time

MeatHead1313 · Jul 26, 2014

blorvak said:
Hey thanks!

I'll wait on the Black Hungarian peppers. It had one pod when I first planted it out, and I waited for that one to turn red, but it kinda turned deep maroon and then dried out. I'll keep a better eye on them this time

They won't turn bright red like a jalapeno, more dark red/maroon when ripe.

blorvak · Jul 27, 2014

MeatHead1313 said:
They won't turn bright red like a jalapeno, more dark red/maroon when ripe.

Thanks for the info! I'll look for maroon.

Small harvest. First of the tomatoes are coming in. And a Joe E. Parker. It'll be a while before I get another:

PaulG · Jul 27, 2014

Your grow is looking great, John. That Yellow 7 has some mean-arse pods on it!
And pods on the Yellow Rocoto, way to go, bro! I'll swap ya some Orange Manzano
seeds for some Yellow Rocoto this Fall!

Hooray for the return to summer weather! At least the break was only a few days long.

LowDrag · Jul 27, 2014

Things are looking good John. I am glad to see you are starting to get a good run on your plants. Mine are starting to kick into gear too. I went out last night and counted 18 pods on one Serrano and 13 on the other. One of my "Jalapeno's" that isn't a Jalapeno looks like your Aji Limon but more yellow than green at this point but IIRC they started out looking just like yours.

Great job on your peppers and garden in general!!!

Dave

P.S.: I posted some pic's in the PNW Glog RogueJim started.