Growing Chiles in HEL - 2019

Today I took 27 pellets off the heat mats and transplanted them into their first small pots. Then I moved them into my temporary grow room (sauna) under the lights where they will spend the next 60 days or so until it's warm enough to move outside for the summer.
 
I've still got another 75 pellets on the heat mats and will move them to the lamps as they pop.
 
On the tray in the photo, there are two separate LED lamp rigs.
 
The lamp specs: 
 
Strip Length: 61 cm
Watts: 15 watts per strip (45 watts per rig)
Kelvin: 6400K
Lumens: 1500 per strip
PPFD (at 100mm distance): 399 µmol/s/m2 per strip
 

 

[podz]

I've been meaning to pot up my Pico Mucho and one of my Montufars but just haven't gotten around to it. Today, it turned cloudy and started sprinkling so I thought this was a good chance. I pulled out the bok choi and beets from two of my large pallet boxes, cleaned out the roots, mixed up the dirt real deep and then mixed in some lime to give these babies a magnesium kick as they are already producing pods now.
 
Now that the heat wave finally arrived to Finland, these will grow like hell during the next few weeks - especially in the huge boxes. And I am able to give them proper supports. As a major bonus, they will provide me with some privacy on the front side of my hot tub!
 
 
Pico Mucho

 
 
Montufar

 

[podz]

This stuff should provide a good kick of both calcium and magnesium as the ratio is about 9:1. I mixed in, unscientifically, about 100-150 grams to each box.
 

 

[PaulG]

I wish I could read Finnish   
 

I'm not sure if the seeds is what caused it but after they got stuck to leaves with rainwater, when they dried it left "burn spots" on the leaves which then just seemed to spread like hell. Last summer was my first year growing at this new house and we had a severe drought so no such similar problems.

 
I wonder if it is some pathogen other than BLS?
 
Perhaps another bacteria or virus. Too bad you
couldn't test the leaves see what gives.

 

[podz]

I wish I could read Finnish   
 
 
I wonder if it is some pathogen other than BLS?
 
Perhaps another bacteria or virus. Too bad you
couldn't test the leaves see what gives.

 
 
It says:
 
Magnesium containing limestone (dolomite)
Neutralization ability: 37% (calcium)
Fast acting neutralization ability: 24% (calcium)
 
Minerals:
Calcium 30%
Magnesium 3.7%
 
Granularity: 100% of particles smaller than 8mm, 50% smaller than 1mm
Moisture: 5%
 
 
As far as I understood it, you want the Ca:Mg ratio to be between 7:1 (sandy soil) and 10:1 (clay soil), and this stuff seems to be about 9:1 which seems quite OK.

 

[podz]

Success on the transplant operation - sun is out really strong today and it's already hot - those two that I moved to the big boxes yesterday are showing zero signs of transplant shock. But then again, I've been repotting various plants since I was 12 years old and have never had one suffer from transplant shock. I think it comes down to being gentle with the roots during the operation, keeping the substrate loose in the new container instead of packing it down, and giving a good watering after the transplant is finished.
 
Might very well pot up my smaller Montufar to a 30 litre pot today.

 

[podz]

Potted up the smaller Montufar to the 30 litre pot today and it looks fantastic! Tried to espalier my larger Montufar and Pico Mucho but they came out more three-dimensional than two-dimensional :-)
 
I have 2 x 500 litre boxes that I might put two Rojos each in those and leave the remaining 2 in the 30 litre pots. Let's see.

 

[podz]

Mutant Medina
 

 

[podz]

There is starting to be a rocoto jungle on my deck! Manzano Rojos have finally started setting fruit instead of dropping every pod after I started spraying them down with cold water every night.
 

 

[podz]

We had two fairly hot days this past weekend and it launched the pubes into heavy flowering and fruit setting mode. Now the weather has cooled back down again but the pod growth has already started.
 
A rough estimate across the 6 Manzano Rojos, which are now as high as my chin and over 125cm (4ft) wide, is that they now have about 100 pods each and are continuing to set more. Last year, I only grew one of those and it had 28 pods. I am, however, feeding them much heavier this year as well as having them in larger containers.
 
A week ago, switched from GHE to Canna nutes and that does not have appeared to have had anything other than a positive effect. My Bishop's Crown is now nearly as tall as I am and also just set a ton of new pods.

 

[podz]

OK, this is going to be a "jättipostaus" (giant post) as we say in Finnish :-)
 
First of all, I want to show off my absolutely beautiful, first attempt at "Carolina Reaper x Chocolate Scotch Bonnet". This plant got heavily affected by some type of leaf burn earlier this summer, I suspect caused by birch tree seeds, and I cut the top completely off as well as pulling a huge amount of leaves off. A few weeks later and it has spectacularly recovered. Probably too late for it to produce mature pods anymore this summer, but I might just move it into my grow room in the autumn and continue growing it during the winter. It's in a 29 litre (7.6 gallon) container, growing in my own coir-mix.
 

 
 
OK, here are some photos of my Bishop's Crown - this one has the record for the largest plant in my garden. Also growing in a 29 litre container in coir-mix. It is now as tall as my forehead and showing no signs of slowing down.
 

 
 
Orange Flame - this one is in a 12 litre (3.1 gallon) pot in coir-mix. It is basically a stick with a few leaves and a ridiculous amount of pods. Unlike Cayenne and Medina, these actually have full-blown kick while they are still green.
 

 
 
My office chili, a Medina, sitting in dirt in a 16 litre pot with an internal water reservoir. I was on vacation for an entire month and I came back to work  yesterday - it was badly wilted and lost a few leaves. I gave it a good watering and after 24 hours, it made a recovery. There are even a few pods on it.
 

 
 
Manzano Rojos, nuff said.
 

 
 
Pico Mucho, produces nice clusters of flower buds.
 

 

[podz]

Weather has been completely strange and unpredictable this year. Daytime highs are between 16-22c (60-72f), which is cooler than normal. Nights are now down to 10-12c (50-54f). The pubes seem to like it and are all continuing to flower heavily and set new pods every day. We haven't had any rain in quite a while, so that is great in terms of keeping down the pests and diseases as well as not washing the nutes out of the pots immediately after feeding. Due to the low temps and terrace building this summer, I didn't even bother hooking up the drip irrigation system so the plants are only getting watered/fed once per week.
 
We've still got maybe 75 days before the first night frosts come, so there should be plenty of time for pubes to ripen their pods. I might even build a greenhouse on top of each of the large boxes that are now growing a Montufar and a Pico Mucho, let's see.

 

[podz]

Pubes in their morning attitude. Sun hasn't hit them directly yet this morning, so they still got their downward curl thing going on.
 

 

 

 

 

[CaneDog]

Looks like you have a horde on your hands, Podz.

 

[podz]

Looks like you have a horde on your hands, Podz.

 
I have 6 Manzano Rojos. They are generally really large plants. They are podding up in large numbers now, so the tomato cages aren't really going to handle the job and I need to go out and buy some 2 meter bamboo sticks today.
 
I am hoping to get 30 ripe pods from each of those, and they weigh at least 60 grams each so that would be 11kg (24 lbs). Let's see when it gets closer to October :-)

 

[podz]

Here is one of my Manzano Rojos. To put the size of the plant into perspective, the pot is 29 litres (7.6 gallons) and the growth is already way past the top of the 105cm (41 inches) tall tomato cage.
 

 
 
Bright flowers are great for attracting bees!
 

 
 
A bit bigger picture of the terrace and deck area.
 

 
 
We built a mini-shed to keep our garden tools and equipment from cluttering up the yard. Still need to stain it tomorrow and then properly attach the roof.
 

 

[podz]

The rojos are still setting pods, way up on the top of the plants and they will not survive without support. Finally got some 2 metre (78 inches) bamboo poles to support my rojos and bishop's hat, only had time to test them in one pot so far. These should be tall enough, finally.
 

 
 
The new shed is surrounded by "impending orbs of hot juiciness" to quote Stettoman!
 

 

[internationalfish]

I am hoping to get 30 ripe pods from each of those, and they weigh at least 60 grams each so that would be 11kg (24 lbs). Let's see when it gets closer to October :-)

 
...holy crap, that's a lot of pod. 

 

[podz]

 
...holy crap, that's a lot of pod. 

 
 
With proper support staking in place, they could easily do 100 pods per plant on a first year specimen. These are podding up so heavy now, the output will only depend on how far I am willing to go in staking them and how much space that requires.
 
Manzano Rojos grow to be like trees. If you have them growing outside in equatorial climates, they can live up to 15 years and grow to the size of an entire side of a house. A plant that size can easily produce 100kg of fruit.
 
I don't have so much space but I might try to overwinter a few of them this year. Maybe at my work office, for example.

 

[internationalfish]

Very cool! Impressive plant. Tree. Spiciness generator. Thing.

 

[PaulG]

Mika, your deck looks like it has been there forever!