Deolater 2019

Howdy all, new guy to the forum here. This will be my second year growing hot peppers. Last year I got into the hobby when a friend gave me some of his extra plants. It was a ton of fun and I had some good results, but this year I'm going all in.

Grow list:

I kind of covered myself in glue and rolled through the catalog on fataliiseeds

Fatalii Gourmet Jigsaw
Carolina Reaper x 7pot Douglah
Carolina Reaper x Clavo Red
7pot Primo x Purple Bhut
7pot Bubblegum Yellow
Purple Bhut Jolokia
White Fatalii
Numex twilight
Pink Habanero
Ramiro
Lemon drop
? (Saved seeds from last year, forgot to label)
?? (Saved seeds from last year, unlabeled)
Chocolate Bhut
Golden habanero
Montufar
Pequin
Cayenne fiesta mix
Jalapeno
Anaheim

I started out in those Jiffy trays, and started 5 cells of each variety, for 100 total.

This is way more than I can grow, but I've got scars from last year when I only had one plant of each variety. I'll probably be begging people to take some of these off my hands are some point.


The first tray of ~50 are now in Solo cups under a grow light in a tent in my basement, and the second tray is mostly sprouted.

I live in a wooded suburban neighborhood, so while I have plenty of space outside, I don't have a lot of space that also gets light. I'm hoping I'll be able to keep about 25 total plants, with some in ground and some in containers.

 

[deolater]

Time for some ripe pod pics!

First up is this unknown pepper from seeds I saved last year. It's either a ghost or a ghost crossed with something.

Just unbelievably hot. I ate a tiny piece and got hiccups and chest pain. My coworkers fared much the same. The four of us only made it through a third of the pod.

Second was this Primo X Purple Bhut

This was hot. Much hotter than a habanero, but not nearly as hot as the unknown pepper. Pleasant flavor, the group of us ate the whole thing.


Some of these peppers will be going to work with me tomorrow. Numex Joe E. Parker, yellow cayenne, habaneros, Reaper X 7 Pot Douglah, white fatalii.

Here's the Reaper X Douglah in more detail

And finally, more of those unknown peppers are getting ripe

 

[deolater]

State of the garden, 1 July 2019

I realized I haven't posted an overview of the entire garden, so here we go.

The vast majority of my plants are along the side of the driveway. This is the part of my yard that gets the most reliable sunlight. My neighborhood is mature hardwood forest (except where it has been cleared for things like driveways and lawns), so there's a lot of pleasant shade, but not a lot of places to grow plants.

I was definitely worried about this container garden being an eyesore, but now that the plants have grown it looks okay.

Two slightly closer views

From this angle the basic shape of the grow is sort of a backwards L. With a double "row" in the front and then a long "column" along the side of the driveway. Behind the plants are silverthorn bushes that I'll probably remove next year for more growing space.

View along the column

Further along

I have seriously neglected to prune my tomatoes.

I also have this group of plants here in the middle of the driveway. There's a bit more afternoon shade here, so I've put some younger plants here as sort of a halfway-house for hardening up.

I counted my pepper plants today, and not counting the two Kratky experiments or a bunch of plants stuck in the seedling stage, I have 42 pepper plants. More than I planned, but not insane

 

[PaulG]

Your plants look great. Nice dense, green  foliage.
Georgia sun is good to you  
 
Pods in your future! Can't wait to see some color there!

 

[BDASPNY]

wow! those look beautiful!

 

[deolater]

Your plants look great. Nice dense, green  foliage.
Georgia sun is good to you  
 
Pods in your future! Can't wait to see some color there!

I don't know why I didn't include these other pictures:

My purple ghost plant is just covered in fruit. Last year nothing except Lemon Drop produced this much. The pods were initially bright purple, like little amethysts, but now they're getting a creamy color

Probably my prettiest plant is this Numex Twilight, but they DO NOT taste good

I'm surprised at how many pods I'm getting per node on this Reaper X Douglah plant. I know chinense can have more than one pod per node, but it didn't happen much for me last year.

Finally my office kratky Numex Twilight isn't exactly thriving, but it is surviving and starting to flower.

 

[PaulG]

The Reaper x Douglah looks awesome.
Those pods will be stunning when they
color up!

 

[stc3248]

Very nice pepper container island! I always grow several newmex ornamental varieties. For the most part they are tough and chewy with zero sweet/fruitiness. Not good on their own, BUT if you wait for them to ripen full red dry them, throw them in the food processor with some garlic and onion powder...throw in a little sea or kosher salt to taste...then pulse them into some flakes they're actually good. If you smoke them slightly before drying them they come out smokey/nutty and delicious. 
 
Once again plants look like they're digging what you're doing! Keep us the awesomeness.

 

[deolater]

The Reaper x Douglah looks awesome.
Those pods will be stunning when they
color up!

I need to stop picking them right as they ripen!

The other Reaper X Douglah plant has ripened to a rich chocolate brown. I'm curious which color this one will be.

 

[deolater]

Very nice pepper container island! I always grow several newmex ornamental varieties. For the most part they are tough and chewy with zero sweet/fruitiness. Not good on their own, BUT if you wait for them to ripen full red dry them, throw them in the food processor with some garlic and onion powder...throw in a little sea or kosher salt to taste...then pulse them into some flakes they're actually good. If you smoke them slightly before drying them they come out smokey/nutty and delicious. 
 
Once again plants look like they're digging what you're doing! Keep us the awesomeness.

Thanks for the recipe! I was probably just going to leave them for the birds.

The plants have been loving the weather lately

 

[deolater]

Some pods for Independence Day

This is from the Primo X Purple Ghost plant. The first pod from this plant was round and knobby, but all the later pods are pointy like this one with scorpion tails.

Conjoined twin white fataliis?

Lots of these unknown peppers ripening at once

 

[deolater]

Got pods?

 

[deolater]

 

[PaulG]

Got pods?

 
Not like those, my friend! 

 

[deolater]

I've decided that these guys are going to become my first hot sauce of the year

What other ingredients would be good for these brown reaper X 7pot peppers?

Made a thread asking that question here: http://thehotpepper.com/topic/71924-what-are-some-good-ingredients-for-a-brown-superhot-sauce/

 

[deolater]

I haven't had time for sauce making yet. My wife has been working all weekend and the kids (both younger than 5) have not given me much time for anything.

I did pick those peppers though!

Produce of two plants here, both the same cross.

One plant produces fatter pods that ripen to a darker brown with mostly smooth skin, while the other plant's pods are narrower, redder, and bumpier.

I should probably pick one for next generation...

 

[deolater]

Another cross, Primo X Purple Ghost has been ripening some pods.

They have been really tasty. Caribbean pepper fruity rather than ghost perfumy, and really hot.

On two of my plants the pods start out purple, then go green for a while, before ripening to red

The plant that isn't showing any purple is also making rounder fruits.

Finally I have this mystery. Did I mention the Cup o'Rejects before? When I was moving seedlings to Solo cups, I had a number of redundant seedlings that I couldn't bring myself to trash, so I put them all together in one cup. I have three plants from that cup, and while they're not my healthiest plants, they're doing alright. But they are unidentified

One of them is producing pods that look nothing like anything else I'm growing.

I'm very curious to see how that turns out.

 

[CaneDog]

Finally I have this mystery. Did I mention the Cup o'Rejects before? When I was moving seedlings to Solo cups, I had a number of redundant seedlings that I couldn't bring myself to trash, so I put them all together in one cup. I have three plants from that cup, and while they're not my healthiest plants, they're doing alright. But they are unidentified

One of them is producing pods that look nothing like anything else I'm growing.

I'm very curious to see how that turns out.

 
Hey Deolater. Lots of cool stuff and great to see the harvests rolling in.  I'm curious, what do the flowers look like on the CoR plant with the lobed pods? Is there any color to them?

 

[deolater]

Hmm, no good open flowers right now, but I don't remember any color.

I reviewed some old seedling photos and I think the CoR was populated entirety from my first seed tray. If correct, it can only have one of these varieties:

Fatalii Gourmet Jigsaw
Carolina Reaper x 7pot Douglah
Carolina Reaper x Clavo Red
7pot Primo x Purple Bhut
7pot Bubblegum Yellow
Purple Bhut Jolokia
White Fatalii
Numex twilight
Pink Habanero
Ramiro

But nothing else has come out lobed like these. My bookkeeping could be wrong though.

 
Hey Deolater. Lots of cool stuff and great to see the harvests rolling in.  I'm curious, what do the flowers look like on the CoR plant with the lobed pods? Is there any color to them?

Hmm, no good open flowers right now, but I don't remember any color.

I reviewed some old seedling photos and I think the CoR was populated entirety from my first seed tray. If correct, it can only have one of these varieties:

Fatalii Gourmet Jigsaw
Carolina Reaper x 7pot Douglah
Carolina Reaper x Clavo Red
7pot Primo x Purple Bhut
7pot Bubblegum Yellow
Purple Bhut Jolokia
White Fatalii
Numex twilight
Pink Habanero
Ramiro

But nothing else has come out lobed like these. My bookkeeping could be wrong though.

I think next year I'm sticking to established varieties so I have some hope of identifying things

 

[CaneDog]

Well that one pod has a really uncommon and cool look to it. I'm definitely interested to see how things develop.

 

[deolater]

Speaking of unusual pods...

I gave my boss one of my unknown saved seeds plants (probably ghost), and he has been getting these monster pods. Super hot but not very flavorful.

Comment here about my small hands...