Growing Chiles in HEL - 2019

podz · Apr 29, 2019

And I was wrong - the Annuums have got flower buds on them already now this evening. Wednesday is a bank holiday and I have no plans; many of those plants may be in for a serious pruning.

Lights are still on 24-7, not sure if turning them off at night would do much to slow down the growth rate or not. Internodal spacing is pretty close to perfect right now and I am not able to completely black out the growing area, so turning the lights off would probably just cause them to stretch and lean which is really not what I want.

I may just go ahead and do a final potting up of four of the most prime examples and move them onto a bench next to the south facing window in my bedroom and then prune the rest.

podz · Apr 29, 2019

The canopy

Flower buds already visible

A rescue project of 3 Rocoto Montufars I got from an acquaintance. She said these have been growing since Christmas! They were in plastic containers full of sandy mud and no drainage hole. I am guessing they never got nutrients since the juice ran out of their cotyledons because they are yellow now instead of green, but they do have long roots. I repotted them for now with the same mud into containers with drainage holes, gave them some of my standard nute solution and then propped them up close to the lamps. If all that doesn't kill them by tomorrow, then I'm going to do a root rinse and repot them into my standard coir-perlite-vermiculite mix. Not really expecting anything to come out of these, but it will be interesting to see if I am able to rescue them :-)

podz · Apr 30, 2019

Rocotos and a bottle of bubbly

Rocotos overnight in their little protective houses

podz · Apr 30, 2019

Since this years grow is happening almost entirely in coir, decided to up my game and get a few tools. Now I can stop guessing and start "dialing in".

podz · May 1, 2019

These are the conditions my pubes are living outside in during the next 10 days. Temperatures are in celcius. If you want to convert, just type into google search box "4c in f" for example and it will give you the temp in fahrenheit.

Friday, Saturday and Sunday nights are supposed to be hovering right at freezing plus or minus one or two celcius degrees. I don't know how they do it in Sweden but I don't bring the pubes in for that little cold snap; this is the stuff that builds their character.

Meanwhile, all of my special snowflake peppers (Annuum, Baccutum and Chinense) are still living inside the warm house under lamps. Still 8 weeks to grow and arrive at the temperature window for Pubes to flower outdoors - going for a crop of at least 300 Pube pods this year.

chelicerae · May 1, 2019

podz said:
These are the conditions my pubes are living outside in during the next 10 days. Temperatures are in celcius. If you want to convert, just type into google search box "4c in f" for example and it will give you the temp in fahrenheit.

Friday, Saturday and Sunday nights are supposed to be hovering right at freezing plus or minus one or two celcius degrees. I don't know how they do it in Sweden but I don't bring the pubes in for that little cold snap; this is the stuff that builds their character.

Meanwhile, all of my special snowflake peppers (Annuum, Baccutum and Chinense) are still living inside the warm house under lamps. Still 8 weeks to grow and arrive at the temperature window for Pubes to flower outdoors - going for a crop of at least 300 Pube pods this year.

2019-05-01 07.55.41 am.png

Haha, I'm watching this space to learn more about growing rocotos outdoors herearound : )

Looking very good so far.

podz · May 1, 2019

chelicerae said:
Haha, I'm watching this space to learn more about growing rocotos outdoors herearound : )

Looking very good so far.

Nothing like a little friendly jab at the neighbors :-) I was fascinated by your observations in your glog regarding the flowering and fruiting of your pube in the grow tent with regards to the fan. I learned something from you, or actually honed my understanding of something which my intuition already told me: pubes won't set fruit if the flowers are too hot, which is why you saw the seemingly peculiar behaviour with your plant only setting fruits on the side that was exposed to the fan. That's why pubes set fruit when the nights are cold and the days are warm - no warm day equals no bees and too hot equals no fruit set.

The pubes don't mind the cold nights, especially under the cloches. However, cloches are a double-edged sword - if you don't get up and remove them early enough in the morning then the plants can bake to death real fast. They have permanent side vents and a top vent that I leave fully open, but still they overheat in the direct sun. Especially since the pots are black (which is also a double-edged sword). Black pots can warm up the growing medium nicely and keep roots warm overnight, but they can also warm up too much when the cloches are on and that can spell disaster.

HEL sun came up at 5:18 today and not a cloud in sight. And I have removed all sun obstructions from my backyard, so it really comes full-on powerful. By the time I woke up at 10 and went outside to check on the pubes, they were droopy-droopy super wilted. Another half an hour might have killed them. I removed the cloches and moved them to the shade and they fully recovered within an hour. They are back in the sun now enjoying spring.

podz · May 1, 2019

Out for the night now. Temp for this night is 6C (42F).

SentencedToBurn · May 1, 2019

Hey looks like an awesome grow mate!

Just wondering if you have a model number / brand / spec sheet for the LED strips you're using? I've been looking to have another go at LEDs, tried switching from my T8s ages ago but that was when LEDs were still a bit rubbish, it seems they've come a long way now so keen to try what you're using at the moment as it seems to work very well!

podz · May 2, 2019

SentencedToBurn said:
Hey looks like an awesome grow mate!

Just wondering if you have a model number / brand / spec sheet for the LED strips you're using? I've been looking to have another go at LEDs, tried switching from my T8s ages ago but that was when LEDs were still a bit rubbish, it seems they've come a long way now so keen to try what you're using at the moment as it seems to work very well!

The lamps are from a Swedish company called Nelson Garden. The specs are written on the first page of this glog.

I attribute the good grow to a number of factors:

- potting mix (this is my first grow in coir)
- water (Helsinki water has an EC of about 0.1)
- lights
- nutrients
- fresh air input and exhaust ventilation
- air circulation with a fan blowing on the plants

Lamps have been on 24-7 since seed popping. Plus I am spending about an hour per day in the grow room, so that gives them CO2.

podz · May 2, 2019

OK the rocotos spent a few nights outside but now the weather has taken a turn for the worse and they came inside. A few hours of -2c would be ok but not when it's coming down as freezing rain. Hasn't rained in over a month and now when the trees are full of pollen, seeds and all sorts of other crap then it is all coming down at once and even finds its way inside the cloches through the vents. Just plain nasty weather outside now, good thing we took care of all the up potting etc during the past few days while it was warm and sunny.

I guess the rocotos are going back outside on Sunday night and then hopefully no more freezes or freezing rain.

Thinned my bigger chiles from 34 down to 24 yesterday evening and my wife gave away those extras to her colleagues at work. 4-5 weeks until permanent outside and they are growing fast. Still didn't prune or trim them, but I will likely have to do it during this weekend or those 24 simply don't fit.

SentencedToBurn · May 2, 2019

podz said:
The lamps are from a Swedish company called Nelson Garden. The specs are written on the first page of this glog.

I attribute the good grow to a number of factors:

- potting mix (this is my first grow in coir)
- water (Helsinki water has an EC of about 0.1)
- lights
- nutrients
- fresh air input and exhaust ventilation
- air circulation with a fan blowing on the plants

Lamps have been on 24-7 since seed popping. Plus I am spending about an hour per day in the grow room, so that gives them CO2.

Hey thanks very much

Yeah about the specs I meant like the COB model numbers etc, so I could find something similar. I found the company you mentioned so have the data I'm after, thanks again!

podz · May 3, 2019

SentencedToBurn said:
Hey thanks very much

Yeah about the specs I meant like the COB model numbers etc, so I could find something similar. I found the company you mentioned so have the data I'm after, thanks again!

You're welcome. I think I know what you mean regarding the LED lamps - trying to buy a good one is like swimming through an ocean of snake oil advertisements. I'm currently in the market for a more powerful one with a wider spectrum and a decent coverage area so I need to spend shitloads of time doing online research from the 420 sites because nobody else cares.

podz · May 3, 2019

The new tools are finally paying off.

I use the Bluelabs EC Truncheon to dial in the combo of FloraMicro and FloraMato to 2.10 (meter blinks between 2.0 and 2.2). Then I use the Bluelabs PH meter to see where I am - dropped from 7.5 plain water to 6.0 fertilised water. This is with 20ml of FloraMicro and 30ml of FloraMato for a full-on, sexually mature plant grow target of 2.10 EC.

Dudes at the grow shop where I bought the meters said that folks normally need to use PH Down with Helsinki water after adding nutes, but I'm thinking they might have had a J too many for breakfast since they didn't even charge me for the PH down? Need to go to the shop around noon and get some PH up because from what I can gather my target should be around 6.8 or so?

skullbiker · May 4, 2019

podz said:
The new tools are finally paying off.

I use the Bluelabs EC Truncheon to dial in the combo of FloraMicro and FloraMato to 2.10 (meter blinks between 2.0 and 2.2). Then I use the Bluelabs PH meter to see where I am - dropped from 7.5 plain water to 6.0 fertilised water. This is with 20ml of FloraMicro and 30ml of FloraMato for a full-on, sexually mature plant grow target of 2.10 EC.

Dudes at the grow shop where I bought the meters said that folks normally need to use PH Down with Helsinki water after adding nutes, but I'm thinking they might have had a J too many for breakfast since they didn't even charge me for the PH down? Need to go to the shop around noon and get some PH up because from what I can gather my target should be around 6.8 or so?

The EC looks good. I usually have the ph in my Kratky hydros near 6.0–6.1.

podz · May 4, 2019

skullbiker said:
The EC looks good. I usually have the ph in my Kratky hydros near 6.0–6.1.

Just asking, man, since most places on the net recommend something higher but then I have also read that 6 is good?

podz · May 4, 2019

Five weeks and my girls are rocking. Especially now since I have cranked up the nutes about three times what they were before. EC meter gives me confidence to grow.

Flowers are coming and my wife is going to get busy with the paintbrush real soon now.

podz · May 6, 2019

Thinning out the Jungle

The plants in the sauna have been growing with a vengeance, like a supercharged, bionic, GHE-powered robot army. I took out half the plants 6 days ago due to space and had to half it again yesterday because they were quickly getting entangled with each other. Now, the total of the big Annuums and a single Baccatum that are under my lamps at a count of 12. On average, I have had to raise the lamps by a few cm every day and the internodes on the peppers are not far apart by any stretch of the imagination.

Inspecting the Leaves

Thought I might have had an aphid attack, but upon closer inspection it only happened to the padrons (which were randomly intermingled and not isolated). There is some sort of strange leaf edema - little, hard bumps sort of like a skin rash but definitely not caused by any insect or pest. I think the padrons have specifically reacted to either too much or too little of some nutrient (probably the last dose was a little on the heavy side because some leaves are a darker green than I have ever seen except on mistletoe). But this was also the problem with having way too many plants on one shelf - I could not easily inspect them.

The Weather

Outside nighttime temps are warm enough for rocotos but nothing else - they are already back outside after the snow stopped. Days are quite perfect and even violently sunny for 16 and a half hours but the nights are still dropping down to 4C (39F) and maybe even 3C. I had one volunteer basil plant outside and after the last cold snap, it died. Anybody who has an unobstructed greenhouse right now is able to get super-explosive growth - I don't have one nor will my neighbors allow me to get one. Which means that if I want to put plants out during the day then I need to pot up from the 1 litre to 12 litre pots else they 1) dry out during the day, and 2) won't have proper support or protection in the wind. If I pot them up then I have to carry that pepper army back inside my house every evening and there is no space for all that. If I try to put up a tunnel or anything like that, it wouldn't even last an hour before the wind carried it away. No joke, I have some heavy-duty Weber grilling tongs hanging off the front of my grill and they are just constantly swinging in the wind.

The Evicts

These are the peppers that are now evicted from the grow room and hopefully will find people to adopt them. I will still have to thin down my cucumbers, eggplants and squash. Never expected to have this great success this year, but the LED lamps have been a total game changer. Without them, I wouldn't be able to grow in my sauna because there is not sufficient heat evacuation. Even CFL lamps would run too hot.

podz · May 9, 2019

OK, the Manzano Rojos are potted up into their final homes for the summer - 29 litre pots (7.6 gallon). The mix is 70% coir, 20% vermiculite and 10% perlite. This is an outdoors mix so that it doesn't dry out so damned fast.

Here are the girls in their summer homes!

And here we have a "Pineapple Mint" potted up into a 12 litre pot - this mint smells like no other. Should be interesting in a Mojito :-)

And finally, no garden (mojito) is complete without a peppermint. In a 12 litre pot.

podz · May 11, 2019

I've got a Rocoto Montufar growing from seed, about 6 weeks since I planted it and about 2-3 weeks since it sprouted. It's a slow grower, having thus far reached a grand height of about 10cm. Very curiously, this plant is already forking as you can see in the photo below. I should just up pot it and move it outside already with the rest of the pubes.