First Time Gardener, Mishaps & Exploits

First time gardener here, 9b in Southern California, have around 550-600 square feet of space to use.  Starting a garden this year, because its the first time I've had room for more than one or two plants in the last 6 years and I have hated vegetables outside of a small range since I was a kid.  I'm hoping I can help kick my issue with vegetables this year by growing them.  This all started with a drunken night celebrating and ordering some mystery "Super hot, Pepper Seed mix" off of Ebay.  No clue if the seeds will actually be true to their labels, Reaper, Red and Peach Ghost, Trinidad Scorpion and Orange Habanero.  Since I made this mistake, and didn't realize it until the item had shipped, I figured I would give it a go anyways.  My girlfriend was down (not for the peppers) to grow other assorted veggies and has since become annoyed with all of my pepper stuff that is growing.  I ordered a few types of seeds from White Hot Peppers, Bahamian Beast Peach F3, Sugar Rush Red, Purple UFO, Swamp Thing, Fatalii Chocolate, Bahamian Goat, Satan's Kiss and Aji Pineapple.  I will probably have to ninja those seeds straight into potting mix outside in my garden, because I might be murdered if my girlfriend sees me setting up a mini-greenhouse inside our house again.  I also picked up a few peppers at Cal Poly Pomona's Pepperzania about a month ago, a Carolina Reaper, Chocolate 7-pot, Himo Togarashi and one I am drawing a complete blank on.  Garden also includes your typical garden veggies, tomatoes (few different types), cucumbers, sweet corn, squash (no clue what type), carrots, beets or radishes (drawing a blank) and I am pretty sure I am forgetting something.
 
Most plants are in cloth planter bags (is that what they're called?) and all the seeds will be ninja'ed into 2 gallon cloth bags and put out of direct line of sight from my overseer.  I will take some pictures and post them up when I have time, currently at work and had a few extra minutes to type this up.  I will be enlisting help via pictures of issues I know I will have, currently fighting off a bug infestation of earwigs, neem oil should be at my place tomorrow (diatomaceous earth hasn't helped much).
 
Pepper List:
 
Cal Poly Pomona Plants:
Reaper
Chocolate 7-Pot
Himo Togarashi
One I am going blank on
 
Mystery Seeds:
Reaper
Red and Peach Ghost
Trinidad Scorpion
Orange Habanero
 
Actual Seeds from White Hot Pepper:
Bahamian Beast Peach F3 
Sugar Rush Red 
Purple UFO 
Swamp Thing
Fatalii Chocolate 
Bahamian Goat 
Satan's Kiss 
Aji Pineapple

 

[DWB]

Got home to my possible Trinidad Scorpion having self destructed in its Kratky setup. It’s too dark and a flashlight doesn’t help too much, but it’s looking like possible root rot has set in. Going to take a look in the morning and trim back the root and clean out the tub before giving it fresh water.

Leh sigh, the plant was starting to put out a lot of peppers.


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I hope your potential TS is OK. I hate it when a nice plant keels over with or without a dam gud reason.
 
I still haven't seen a tomato hornworm this year. Usually that's the only pest I see. The lack of those fugly bastids has been more than made up for by the crowds of all the other nasties.
 

 

[simp3204]

The TS plant got root rot like my pumpkin did, I cut back the roots and cleaned out its Kratky reservoir. Hopefully, it will survive like my pumpkin did. It has close to two dozen peppers on it and I want them to grow to maturity. *tears*


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[DWB]

I hope the plant is okay. I remember the huge pumpkin getting sick but I forgot the outcome. I'm glad it recovered.

 

[simp3204]

I hope the plant is okay. I remember the huge pumpkin getting sick but I forgot the outcome. I'm glad it recovered.

The pumpkin vine is still alive, but it’s not liking the summer heat. I’m wondering if it will flower again or just quit trying to live.


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[simp3204]

Found 10 of these bastards in my garden, with the 6 below between two plants. They stripped the plants overnight. *tears* Luckily the plants didn’t have any peppers on them yet.

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[CaneDog]

Empathy like.
 
Good that you're in SoCal and have the long season.  Healthy plants often bounce back with a vengeance after suffering trauma so hopefully yours do!

 

[Mr.joe]

I may need to go hunting tonight see if I can find their cousins.

 

[skullbiker]

I may need to go hunting tonight see if I can find their cousins.

Get yourself an inexpensive UV flashlight on Amazon for spotting them at night. They show up pretty good then.

 

[Mr.joe]

Get yourself an inexpensive UV flashlight on Amazon for spotting them at night. They show up pretty good then.

That's exactly what I do. I've found tons of them that I never would have found otherwise.

 

[podz]

Found 10 of these bastards in my garden, with the 6 below between two plants. They stripped the plants overnight. *tears* Luckily the plants didn’t have any peppers on them yet.

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You get hit by one of those orange spikes and you will wish that it only felt like you just downed 10 carolina reapers.

 

[Mr.joe]

 
 
You get hit by one of those orange spikes and you will wish that it only felt like you just downed 10 carolina reapers.

Really? I've never heard of anyone getting hurt by one of those stupid worms. Reapers hurt everyone

 

[dragonsfire]

Have had this guy for 5 years.
https://www.amazon.ca/gp/product/B00PW0IOKG/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1

 

[simp3204]

My UV light is the only reason I am able to find the tiny babies on my plants. I wouldn’t have known to pick one up without the help in this Glog!

Thanks Canedog, they seem to be taking it well.


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[podz]

Really? I've never heard of anyone getting hurt by one of those stupid worms. Reapers hurt everyone

 
Maybe that is not the right one to which I am referring, then. I got stung by some sort of big, fat green caterpillar once when picking tomatoes when I was visiting north america and the pain was unbelievable. And it lasted for more than half an hour.  It looked like one of those you pictured.

 

[CaneDog]

Maybe that is not the right one to which I am referring, then. I got stung by some sort of big, fat green caterpillar once when picking tomatoes when I was visiting north america and the pain was unbelievable. And it lasted for more than half an hour.  It looked like one of those you pictured.

 
There's always these guys - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lonomia_obliqua  Kinda makes you realize as much as the hornworms suck, things could be worse.

 

[Mr.joe]

 
There's always these guys - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lonomia_obliqua  Kinda makes you realize as much as the hornworms suck, things could be worse.

I always wear a glove when picking horn worms. I laugh at myself for not wanting to touch those things. That one you posted I may just wear two gloves.

 

[simp3204]

I always wear a glove when picking horn worms. I laugh at myself for not wanting to touch those things. That one you posted I may just wear two gloves.

I wear gloves too and I’ve touched dead bodies and most other things with no gloves. I have a weird thing with anything that moves like a caterpillar or a worm and how you can feel their muscles trying to undulate.


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[simp3204]

Small harvest pic:

Top left: Green guajillo (going to let them ripen to red for now on).

Middle: Satans Kiss.

Top right: mystery pepper that resembles a Shishito, but has some serious heat, so no clue. Was supposed to be a peach ghost.

Bottom: Red Serrano

Red Ghosts started ripening at the same time on this plant:

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[simp3204]

My Carolina Reaper plant is throwing some sort of hybrid pod. In person resembles a mini-pumpkin, very small and adorable.

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[simp3204]

Small harvest this morning of red ghost, what was supposed to be peach ghost and a couple jalapeños that looked tasty. Took a pic of the prettiest red ghost that looks extra spicy.

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