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Growing peppers near the ocean

SadisticPeppers

SadisticPeppers

eXtreme Business
It's beginning to look more and more like I may be getting a job promotion in the coming weeks/months, which will allow me to move ~60 miles north of where I currently live in Broward county up to Palm Beach county. As fate would have it, my parents have a house there, and from speaking to my dad a few times, it wouldn't hurt to have someone in the family living in it, and taking care of the place.

That being said, the backyard faces east-southeast, and while it isn't directly on the ocean, it is only a couple hundred yards away, and it's about 30 feet up on one of the only oolite ridges this far south in the state that the backyard gets direct sun literally at sunrise everyday and direct sun for the bulk of the day, as well as a direct seabreeze all day. The portion of the backyard that is between the enclosed patio and the back fence is sufficiently wide for about ~60 plants (3 rows times 20 plants a row spaced 1 foot apart), and even in the wintertime, the temperatures rarely dip below the low 70's/high 60's thanks to the seabreeze. Also, the fence isn't a solid fence, but an aluminum rod fence, which has no trouble letting the breeze in. To give you an idea, my parents' Jack Russell has had little trouble fitting between two of the bars if he was feeling particularly mischevious and wanted to run off, so seabreeze isn't a problem. Also, it is right next to a "grove" I guess you could call it of native Florida plants between the fence and the road ~75 feet away, and I've seen no shortage of bees and other good insects that cheerfully pollenate away.

Would there be any special concerns with the pepper plants being only a few hundred yards removed from the ocean? Also, would there be a special advantage to the peppers with the existing soil having calcium already in it, since oolite, being a kind of limestone, is high in minerals, especially calcium, but is kind of lacking in organics so of course I'd have to suppliment with fertilizer, but beyond that, is there anything special I would need?
 
mygrassisblue said:
Sorry I got distracted by my life dream of retiring moving north and driving slow...what's your question ?!?
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To sum up, if I do get the job and take over my parentals' house, since i'll be living so close to the ocean, are there any special precautions that I'd need to do? Being so close to a large body of salt water such as the Atlantic, the seabreeze tends to bring in air that's slightly more humid and laced with ocean minerals than would be otherwise, at least I would think so. The soil has a lot of minerals, especially calcium on account of the oolite only a few inches down, so adding fert will be a given, but I was also curious if there was anything else I should look out for.

In times past, my mom had little trouble harvesting tomatoes, pineapples, citrus, and was known to grow the occasional rose bush, so I imagine it wouldn't too terribly different, but again, it never hurts to ask if anyone on here had more experience with cultivationg near the ocean, and if they had any tips/tricks.
 
I live close to the ocean and have no troubles.

In fact I live on a corner lot, with brackish canals on both sides... ~100 yards from the ocean as the crow flies ( about a mile by water).

I think hurricanes would be about your only concern, and they likely concern you where you are living now any way haha
 
jsschrstrcks said:
I live close to the ocean and have no troubles.

In fact I live on a corner lot, with brackish canals on both sides... ~100 yards from the ocean as the crow flies ( about a mile by water).

I think hurricanes would be about your only concern, and they likely concern you where you are living now any way haha
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KK, cool. I've laready lived through several hurricanes down here, and even if I were to lose my crops, I'd be out maybe 4-5 months at the most since I could just as easily grow them from seeds, given my recent success rate in germinating seeds. Just wanted to make sure. The job isn't a 100% definite thing yet, but every e-mail I get back from the powers that be indicate that they want me for that job and they want me up there, they just have to go through all the official motions with HR, which, when you consider who I work for, can take a while.

So being up there will not only solve the problem of where to live as far as a transfer, but it also helps my folks, and gives me tons more room to grow peppers, not to mention grow them outside for a change, and not have to spend money on keeping CFL's lit every day. The timing of it will work out pretty well too, since if I start, I'll likely start sometime around September or October which is around the time the rental agreement my folks signed with the people renting their place is ending.

mygrassisblue said:
Most of my fam. lives in FL. and NC on the coast. The only issues will be overspray when the neighbors spray their lawns and shrubs.
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I don't forsee that as a problem, since there is a 6-foot high wall dividing the backyard of each property, so unless said overspray boomerangs either over the wall or past it and back onto the porch area (neither of which is likely), I don't think I'll have a problem.
 
I'm not that close, but not too far off and haven't had any issues. In fact I grow some nice orchids and other plants that seem to thrive with the nice cool breeze. My only concearn is I don't get enough sun at times, but the plants still seem to love the cooler nights and breeze.
 
I may be moving to Aruba... It's a desert island, averages 17mph winds, and has salty humid air... Was thinking about taking down a few geo pots and growing some peppers... How do they do with salty humid air, 85-90 degrees every day and always sunny?
Water is all RO from the tap. Can make my own fish emulsion and seaweed :) yay being a diver!
 
Yumyumyellow said:
I may be moving to Aruba... It's a desert island, averages 17mph winds, and has salty humid air... Was thinking about taking down a few geo pots and growing some peppers... How do they do with salty humid air, 85-90 degrees every day and always sunny?
Water is all RO from the tap. Can make my own fish emulsion and seaweed :) yay being a diver!
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Sounds nice! If'n you happen to use that fish emulsion as a fertilizer, let us know how it goes for the peppers. Who knows, you may create a niche market, and have quite the supply all around you :)
 
Yumyumyellow said:
I may be moving to Aruba... It's a desert island, averages 17mph winds, and has salty humid air... Was thinking about taking down a few geo pots and growing some peppers... How do they do with salty humid air, 85-90 degrees every day and always sunny?
Water is all RO from the tap. Can make my own fish emulsion and seaweed :) yay being a diver!
Click to expand...

Wow what an opportunity I frequent aruba and they grow Caribbean red peppers on the island without any problem at all. I've actually red they thrive and grow quit a few peppers on the east side of the island since it's not really inhibited much. I love going to aruba since I free dive and scuba. Plus throw in that you can buy cuban cigars and gamble in downtown and your good to go.

One of my favorite hot sauces is made by Aruba Heat called "Tropical Heat" a perfect blend of pineapple, coconut and mango's with some sweet and heat. I think I brought back a case last year.
 
Good news/bad news:

The good news is, I received an e-mail saying I'm one of the finalists for the job transfer, and will be contacted soon for an interview, if one is even necessary, since the applicants were limited and there were over a dozen openings available. Even though, I stand an outstanding chance of getting the job, the HR folks and those who want the transfers done still need to go through the motions. C'est la vie, but provided I get it, it'll almost certainly mean an instant $6k a year raise for me.

The bad news: the people renting my parents' house want to stay there for a while. Realistically, I can't say I blame them and I see where they were coming from. As much as my folks wanted someone in the family in that house, them being on fixed incomes right now, they need all the extra money they can get, and with me living there, they'd only break even, and even with the homestead exemption increase, with the renters in there, they'd be ahead by a couple hundred bucks every month

But hey, the nice thing is, with the transfer, I can still move up there and get an awesome apartment in the interim while I save up to buy a house of my own. I've already checked, and they've got some good deals going on in the area.
 
Yumyumyellow said:
I may be moving to Aruba... It's a desert island, averages 17mph winds, and has salty humid air... Was thinking about taking down a few geo pots and growing some peppers... How do they do with salty humid air, 85-90 degrees every day and always sunny?
Water is all RO from the tap. Can make my own fish emulsion and seaweed :) yay being a diver!
Click to expand...
Head over to Grenada when you move to Aruba and visit Sunnyside Gardens. Ask for "Randy Yeh Mon". :shocked:
He'll tell you exactly what works, and what doesn't, and hook you up with seeds.
Tell him Blammo sent you.
 
haha I wish I could just hop over there for the weekend and pick up some supplies, but that's a bit far... if i can i'm bringing a suitcase full of dirt.
 
Looks like I may be able to take over my parents' place after all. I spoke with my dad the other day, and after spending two winters up north, he said that he & my mom realized a couple things:
  • The state income tax up there was taking a bigger hit than they thought on their retirement income (they got used to the lack of a state income tax here in Florida...)
  • Shovelling snow off an inclined driveway REALLY SUCKS!
Also, as it stands, the rent they're collecting on their house down here only just BARELY covers their mortgage, taxes & insurance. So with all that, they're looking to become snowbirds, living here from October/November to around Easter or so, and living up north during the spring/summer. That being said, they'll need someone to move into the house and live in it year-round to take care of it when they're not there. It's a heck of an opportunity for me as well, since while it'll mean I've gotta pay more for housing, I'll be able to have a TON more room for growing my pepper plants.

I'll be able save money in several other areas, like electricity. Because the house has a sizeable side patio, I'll be able to put quite a few DWC's right there and have them be in direct sun all day on account of the patio being south-facing. The backyard also has a rather extensive area where I can put raised beds and do drip irrigation. One area in fact, is perfect, since it'll catch the first light of the sun at sunrise, and remain fully lit for most of the day.

I'll also be able to save on other things too, like car insurance (a safe upper-middle class area versus the near-ghetto I live in right now), gasoline (since I'll be transferring up to a different site and working from home several days a week), and on top of that, I'll have my own garage. One thing I discovered living in the last two apartment complexes is that people are really horrible when it comes to parking spots. They don't give a rat's ass if the spot is reserved (as my current parking spot here is), they'll still park in it. That's caused me quite a few headaches when I get home from work, which is another story for another time. But with a garage, I won't have to worry about that any more. There's other little things too, like groceries, etc., which just make the whole area more liveable.

As it stands now, the lease the renters have with my parents ends October 31st, which is actually excellent timing for me, because my own lease ends a month prior, and there's no way I can get out of my lease early without paying through the nose and losing my security deposit in the process. My parents also have a provision in their lease with the renters, where my parents can tell the renters they no longer wish to renew, and if the renters wanna move out without a penalty, they're free to do so. If the renters take advantage of that, I can begin moving my stuff in early, but I'm not exactly holding my breath for that. Also, since I'm their son and will be living in the house full-time, paying the utilities in their name, my parents can claim homestead exemption on the house. They can also claim residency in Florida, and ditch the state income tax up north. Right now, they're looking to not begin doing the snowbird thing until the fall/winter of 2014/2015, so for at least the first 12 months or so, except for the occasional visit for a week, I'll have the house to myself. And after that, since they'll be living up north for most of the year, I'll still have the house entirely to myself for that time. I can also begin, slowly but surely saving up for a place of my own, and have that augmented by the increased number of pepper plants & resulting pepper yields I can expect by having all that outside.
 
My father lives on the ocean and has great luck with growing vegetables. His garden is behind the house so it's shielded from wind and gets full sun. It actually stays warmer there into october because of the protected location. His soil is completely engineered, meaning he dug a large hole next to the patio and filled it with manure and peat etc. Otherwise it would be just sand. I would say mind the wind, otherwise it is no different.

This is a Black Pearl that I put in a pot for the patio. It thrived.



Black Pearl by JB464, on Flickr
 
If you know tomatoes grew there before then peppers shouldnt be a problem, I had problems with salt burn when I lived 200 meters from the ocean but still had a bumper crop of tomatoes and no salt burn on my peppers. The so called saltburn I encountered may have just been from a particularly cold summer as well.
 
My mom told me she was able to grow tomatoes in the soil there with shocking ease, and only occasionally had to use fertilizer. That being said though, I'll definitely still use several DWC's since the side patio is in a primo spot to catch the sun all day. I could easily put 15-20 there ::snicker::
 
I spoke with my mom yesterday, and she seemed almost more excited than I was in growing peppers than I was at the house. Now granted, the earliest I could even realistically start anything would be in September/October (which is assuming I'd even start from Day 1), but still, based on talking to her yesterday, you'd think she was more gung ho about it than I was, especially after the rather sizeable diversity of peppers I received from PepperLover.

That being said, I'm already mentally planning out what I wanna do. I wanna start kinda small-ish, just to see if I can handle this first set of things I wanna do on top of my day job.

The strip of backyard between the back screened patio and the back fence is in the neighborhood of 8 feet wide, and about 40 feet long, so I could easily do quite a few plants there, spacing them a couple feet apart from each other, and also perhaps setting up some netting to help mitigate cross-pollenation somewhat. There is a water connection there, so I could do a drip irrigation setup there without too much trouble. My mom had, at one point, even done a little garden in a section of it, and as mentioned before, had awesome results in growing tomatoes there. More than a few of her tomatoes were 2-3 the size of any I ever saw in a grocery store, and she did so with a mindful eye and a negligible amount of fertilizer, so peppers shouldn't be a stretch there, especially with drip irrigation, and giving them some fertilizer whenever needed. Plus, the plants would benefit from the seabreeze and direct sun for a very good chunk of the day. The other area I'm looking at is by my parents southern wall. No water connection there, so I'd have to manually water them, but it has the benefit of being a more square-shaped area, so I could definitely do some raised beds there if I so chose. The side patio, which is essentially a wide uncovered concrete walkway, I can easily put a few DWC's or use a s a secondary staging/watering area.

The covered patio, I'll almost certainly be using as my main staging area where I could set up several germination stations for each breed of pepper I wanna grow, and use Jiffy pellets for most of them, since I'll be putting them directly into the ground. Oh, and once I get the peppers growing and producing, I found out about several Farmer's Market's in the area, including one just 15 minutes away in Palm Beach Gardens. And if all this takes off, I could call up my friend, the one on the farm who got in touch with me, and see if she's still willing to let me use some of the farmland she's got for my peppers.
 
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