BrooklynXpat's First Grow Season - 2013 - Pod harvest 8/16

Hey THPers!

Just wanted to get my 2013 Grow Season off to a good start. I have begun doing some things and will try to backlog as much of what I did in the log here.

I built 3 4x6 Cedar Raised beds and have a handful of planters that I plan on using to get some more starts for the 2013 season. To fill my Raised beds I bought the following plants from CCN (Cross Country Nurseries in NJ) and have been babying them inside my house near a sliding door with good ambient light since its been real cold for the past 2 weeks.

7 Pot
Datil Sweet
Fatalii
Chocolate Hab
Jalapeno Jumbo
Limo
Marconi Golden
Thai Yellow

Non Peppers
Black Cherry Tomato
Cherokee Purple Tomato
San Marzano Redorta Tomato
Sunsugar Tomato
Black Beauty Eggplant
Cloud Nine

I began hardening them off this week and I think they are almost ready to get outside - monday is only day they say that will drop below 50 @night.

Getting delivery of my 3cu yards of 50/50 mix of organic compost and topsoil

After one of my raised beds was complete

After un-boxing the plants from CCN (ill start taking close-ups)

Repotting into 6" planters

I'm open to suggestions as far as spacing is concerned since i want to maximize my space as much as possible without hindering growth. As you can how my setup is currently for my beds. Dont mind all the dead grass - after Sandy - most things haven't come back yet or are completely dead

Thanks and hope to keep everyone updated with more info/pics as time goes on.

 

[capsidadburn]

Looks great! Good luck with your grow season.

Mike

 

[sicman]

looks like you got yourself all organized. good luck with the grow

 

[BrooklynXpat]

Thanks guys. Took the babies outside today for some much needed sun! They are saying good morning and TGIF!

7Pot

Thai Yellow - this guy grows REALLY quick

Leaning tower of Jalapeno Jumbo - he is desperately waiting to go in the big garden

Limo - hopefully going to be my early hab

Golden Marconi - this thing is flowering already

Datil Sweet

Chocolate Hab

Fatalii

 

[MGOLD86]

Looking good my man! Those babies are gonna love it in those raised beds. I like those beds a lot, they look nice and clean.

As far as spacing goes, if you are planning on getting more, I would go 6 per bed, but you should have enough room to go as much as 8 or 10. A good scenario would be about 18 inches in all directions, but obviously more would be better.

Either way, it looks like those plants are loving the sun and ready for the ground! Ill keep my fingers crossed for good weather.

 

[Nightshade]

Nice grow

 

[BrooklynXpat]

Looking good my man! Those babies are gonna love it in those raised beds. I like those beds a lot, they look nice and clean.

As far as spacing goes, if you are planning on getting more, I would go 6 per bed, but you should have enough room to go as much as 8 or 10. A good scenario would be about 18 inches in all directions, but obviously more would be better.

Either way, it looks like those plants are loving the sun and ready for the ground! Ill keep my fingers crossed for good weather.

Thanks MGOLD- i like the beds a lot too and hopefully next year I can convince my wife to put in another 2-3 of them alongside the right-side fence, so i can double the amount of plants being grown. Need to do a new fence there or put some type of privacy between yards, afraid of my neighbors teenage kids getting drunk and stealing my peppers!

I am going today to a nursery to see if i can pick up a few more peppers, i do have a few 5 gal planters i will fill up (about 5-6). I think i was aiming for around 6 initially but someone mentioned 4-5 might be pushing it, i also have to consider being able to reach the back plants being the fence is there. Thanks for advice on spacing, I'll upload some possible arrangements this weekend for plot layout. Aiming to get them in tuesday or wednesday as we have two nights dipping into 40's in next few days.

Nice grow

Thanks Nightshade

 

[WalkGood]

Great list, plants looking health and love dem raised beds ... they'll be podding before you know, great success in your 2013 grow ^_^

 

[MGOLD86]

Thanks MGOLD- i like the beds a lot too and hopefully next year I can convince my wife to put in another 2-3 of them alongside the right-side fence, so i can double the amount of plants being grown. Need to do a new fence there or put some type of privacy between yards, afraid of my neighbors teenage kids getting drunk and stealing my peppers!

I am going today to a nursery to see if i can pick up a few more peppers, i do have a few 5 gal planters i will fill up (about 5-6). I think i was aiming for around 6 initially but someone mentioned 4-5 might be pushing it, i also have to consider being able to reach the back plants being the fence is there. Thanks for advice on spacing, I'll upload some possible arrangements this weekend for plot layout. Aiming to get them in tuesday or wednesday as we have two nights dipping into 40's in next few days.



Thanks Nightshade

I will tell you the method that I used to go from 3 raised beds to 4 4x15 in ground rows. Build/Dig it when the wife is at work, it works like a charm!

 

[BrooklynXpat]

I will tell you the method that I used to go from 3 raised beds to 4 4x15 in ground rows. Build/Dig it when the wife is at work, it works like a charm!

That would work! The only cost/labor I don't want to deal with this year is the delivery of soil/compost mix. Next year - definitely!

Picked up some cheap jalapeños and some golden bells to do some crossing will post pics later/tomorrow.

 

[BrooklynXpat]

Here is what the guys looked like this weekend when it was VERY gloomy and raining torrentially. I picked up the shop lights a few weeks back big-box for next year's season since they were very cheap and figured it might help in situations like this weekend when we saw almost no daylight.

I rigged it up with chairs and game boxes!

Also - if you notice on the bottom right i picked up a 4 jalapenos and 4 golden bells at nursery to try some cross pollinating and fill garden up this season. 2 more days till they get put in ground!!!!

 

[MGOLD86]

Looks great man. Sucks about the weather, but it looks like you get to bust out your tools and give them a test drive!

 

[Peptacular]

Looking good! Some of those things are shooting right up.

 

[BrooklynXpat]

Looks great man. Sucks about the weather, but it looks like you get to bust out your tools and give them a test drive!

 
Always fun to play with new toys :-D . I cant wait to get these guys in the beds, some of them are looking a little nutrient deficient and i think some nice soil/compost mix will liven them up. Pics to come tomorrow when they are relaxing in their new home.
 

Looking good! Some of those things are shooting right up.

Thanks - some of them are really starting to outgrow these pots - a bunch are flowering :-D

 

[BrooklynXpat]

So I got time today to transplant all plants into ground or larger planter for season, it was on/off drizzle today but i took the chance.

I amended the soil with epsom salt & Azomite and added some egg shells for the tomatoes. Now without further ado - here are the pics and layout i chose.

My tomato and Eggplant bed

 
My sweet/mild/hot bed

 
My mix bed with my hots (most sun exposure on this bed)

 
My Jalapeno's and Golden Bell's for crossing.

 
My 7 Pot looks sickly - its root system was definitely lacking compared to others when i did transplant. I'm hoping the new soil/compost mix will help whatever nutrient deficiency it might have. Any ideas?

 

[BrooklynXpat]

Sorry for delay in update, was traveling for almost 2 weeks and had horrible weather up until 2 days ago - so not much going on.
 
My first pod showing on my Marconi

 
and my 7 pot looking even worse than last time - looks like sunburn to me, hopefully he'll recover with this heat. Think it could be a nutrient deficiency?

 
I also planted about 8 more bell peppers, 8 tomato's and some long beans my wife's grandmother had extra - i placed them randomly in ground, hopefully some will grow.

 

[PIC 1]

I like the layout of the beds and using the cedar is safer around eatibles then treated material, plus the bugs don't like it.

Its hard to tell the issue with the plants as theres bronzing within the veins in some of the leaves. If you can get some ph strips or buy/borrow a ph tester that may give you the answer.

 

[BrooklynXpat]

I like the layout of the beds and using the cedar is safer around eatibles then treated material, plus the bugs don't like it.

Its hard to tell the issue with the plants as theres bronzing within the veins in some of the leaves. If you can get some ph strips or buy/borrow a ph tester that may give you the answer.

Thanks for compliment of beds - after planting alot of extra stuff in soil thats riddled with roots , i cant wait to build more beds next year.
 
This is the only plant with issues, all others are doing pretty good. They are all a bit small which is probably due to us only having a little bit of heat this past week and otherwise bad weather.  They are also all a bit light green, i got some calmag and hoping to use a bit hoping its just magnesium deficiency.
 
A lot of my plants are flowering at this small stage and i know its the age-old debate to debud them or let them be. I want them to grow taller and bigger before podding - but i also have a short season, so its hard to decide.

 

[BrooklynXpat]

So with all the bad weather we were having and my plants looking they were on the brink of death, i decided to experiment with compost tea. I picked up 2 pumps, indonesian bat guan, seaweed powder and the results are amazing. This is my 7 Pot after one week of feeding it compost tea, above photo is what it looked like during feeding. I did compost tea twice now and until my plants look much better will be doing every 7-10 days depending on my travel.
 

 
I will take some more photos today of the remaining portion of garden and my new additions (lots of tomatoes and beans). I think we should be done with most of the heavy rain now and can get some well deserved sunshine

 

[GnomeGrown]

Compost tea is some amazing stuff!
 
Happy Harvests!