Hydro details

[crazy8]

What I have to say right now has nothing to do with hydro but I think is worth mentioning. I started the season with 72 seedlings. I lost most of them, I think mostly to putting them into the ground when they were to little. Some of them even had drown during the watering. Well I was thinking that if I got any peppers this season it would be off the 4 plants in my hydro. Well I looked at them last night and they like beautiful. I have 3 Monzanos that are looking like tomato plants and some super hots that are starting to look amazing. I have also started doing some fertilizing with some miracle grow so hopefully I will get a ton of great peppers still. The on thing that mentioning this DOES have to do with the hydro is for comparison in growth and any viral or insect infestations which in my case I haven't had either yet. So i think in some of the coming weeks I will be using some of my soil based plants and compare against my hydro ones.

Thank you all again for fallowing.

 

[ZanderSpice]

Yes that does make sense. Thanks a lot for your input I will try the 3/6/0 solution next Monday and see how it goes from there. I should keep it at that level then for the rest of the season?

You can increase it a bit later on, but it's probably not necessary. Is the pH still good? The problem with increasing nutrient levels is the growth. Very soon you may find that the plants need some support which will make adding/changing water more difficult. I think that's your biggest concern more than increasing the nutrient levels. I've found it very difficult to handle a single plant in a 5 gallon bucket. I have one in a bucket this year but I'm planning to move it to a much larger container or at least plumbing in a drain and fill so I can tie it to a support and still manage the water.

 

[crazy8]

Maybe this would help you in your 5 gal. bucket but I once saw someone who did a hydro setup in a 5 gal. bucket and drilled 4 little holes into the lid so it could be fitted with one of those metal cylindrical tomato support deals (that's the technical term lol). might be something to consider.

 

[ZanderSpice]

Yeah I saw someone w/ tomato cages in the lid. I suspect it would have to be secured to something or else it would tip over. Once you've secured it is complicated to change out the water. Nothing worse than coming home to a huge plant that has toppled over or run dry. Oh yeah, keep an eye on those white collars, cut it off if it starts to pinch the stem. Here's what happened to me two seasons ago when the plant grew out of control and later tipped over.
Before

Got lucky and saved some

lost this part

 

[crazy8]

I will make sure to do that. Id hate to see all this work, and what looks like will be a great experiment with results, all go to waist because of a dumb little collar.

 

[crazy8]

TEASER: Well its Monday again and I have to tell you all, your in for a real treat. I cheated and looked at the roots and just about fell over. Speaking of falling over it seems that since my roots are doing what they are, my Serano keeps on tipping over just a little. Do any of you have any cleaver ways to keep the plants upright on such a small container?

I will get the pics and measurements up later on today along with the dirt garden plants as I stated I would do in the earlier posting.

 

[crazy8]

Ok so this is a big update will all sorts of good looking pics. Hope you all enjoy.

Looks like another 4 inches in one week. I dont know how tall these plants should get but if this is it hopefully the over all performance keeps up.

Another view.

Here is the height of the little ones (savina and orange hab.). Notice the little buds

The Serano getting ready to fruit.

 

[crazy8]

Here is a distant shot of the babies.

Here is a root shoot. Oh look at them beauts.

There is my hand for size. I didnt measure this time because I wanted to keep their exposure limited. I can tell you that Sunday when I opened it just to look at the roots they were very much on the way of them all entangling with each other.

Now for some size comparison. As I said I would post pics of what I have in the dirt and I have to say I have a few plants doing quite well and I feel if I keep up with the weekly application of miracle grow that maybe things will get even better. So here we go.
Here is what both of my Manzanos look like

 

[crazy8]

Here is another shot of the Manzano.

Lost the label for this one so im not sure what it is.

Here is a larger view of the ones I have posted above....minus the Manzanos, they are on the other end of the shed just around the corner.

And lastly I have the Cayenne's which could be doing better but they are starting to flower and I have also started the miracle grow treatment on these to see if it will help them along.

There you have it. Hope you all enjoy

 

[crazy8]

Well i think I came up with an idea on how to keep these monsters from tipping and making it part of the lid so that I can take it off. I will keep you all posted on how it goes.

 

[crazy8]

Well its Friday which means Monday is coming soon. Well i think this weekend I am going to try a few ideas I have.

1) It was recommended I should remove my white caps that are on the net cups as to not harm the plants. Now to be honest I have forgotten to do this but right now there is no harm being done. The problem though is that then it exposes the cups to any rain that may fall and then get into my res. So what I am going to try is take my Dremel and make the hole in the center bigger along with making the slit bigger and see how well that works.

2) I had to come up with a way to keep the plants from tipping. They don't tip very far but its just from the roots moving and tangling into each other. The idea I have to keep that from happening is running 2 of those green plastic garden stakes on top of each side of the white net cup covers then on each end of the res. lid drill a couple holes for some wire to tie the steaks to the lid. This makes it so I can remove the lid and while moving the lid I don't need to worry about the plants tipping and when the roots want to get all friendly with each other I don't have to worry about the plants tipping.

If I do get both of these done this weekend I will be sure to post some pics of the work for you all.

Thanks Again

 

[crazy8]

Well as Im sure when you all woke up this morning you realized it was Monday. If your not awake yet well you will soon find out and if your onr of few who may not wake up at all you have my condolences. But on a more serious not I noticed something new with the hydro this morning, FRUIT. they are very small but its clear they are there. We also had a huge storm roll through the other day and my plants show no damage. Actually the only thing I did find was one single fallen shriveled up leaf. But the plants are very healthy looking plants. I saw huge 40+ foot trees knocked over but not a single flower drop in site from my plant. So I am very happy to see that. I will have some pictures to post up later tonight. In addition I will post up pictures of the soil plants just as comparison as I didn't even look at those since the last posting. On a side note some of you may be aware that the fiance and I are looking for a home. Well we think we found a great one with lots of room. There is a spot for a garden in the back yard and a huge work bench in the garage that is built in such a way that it is BEGGING to have a ebb and flow setup built right into part of the bench. Not to mention a nice size space under the steps leading to the basement which has a door to close it off that I could get a nice amount of plants started in. My fiance is already rolling her eyes.

 

[crazy8]

Wow already at WEEK 8 Well here it is. Man there is some cool stuff going on. So Ill get right to it. Here are the pics.
First lets take a look at those pods and flowers.

The beginnings of a sarano

Orange Hab

Yellow Peter Peppers

 

[crazy8]

Now you know when you don't pay attention to things and in a week you look at your plants and you wonder what happened to make them grow so quick. Well that kind of happened to me. Here are my Cayenne's remember how little they were? Well when I dump my old nutes I have been dumping it on these plants. Not really in hopes it would do anything but I figured it wouldn't hurt. Well look what happened in a week...

This is only my second year but I have never seen Cayenne's that tall and they already have a couple peppers on them.

Speaking of things growing like weeds check out this Manzano..

I dont know how tall they get but its at 3ft now.

 

[crazy8]

Here is a shot further out.

Here is the other side of the shed with a third Manzano

Here is a close shot of the corner and the neighbors watermelon vine sneaking in. I may charge a watermelon for rent of the vine in our yard....lol

Close up of a couple others.

 

[crazy8]

Now there are a couple things off that I have been noticing...
This appears to be some burning. I think it might be from the Miracle Grow because I started using it here first and the water would appear blue (strong dose) a few times for just a second.

Some interesting leaf curling and that center "vain" looks quite odd to. I have never seen this before so if any of you have any ideas or if its anything to worry about Id greatly appreciate it.

A close up of a Brazilian Starfish (I think)

 

[crazy8]

Now the goods...Check out them roots...

Distant shot...

Over all things seem to be going well. I am hoping to get a wide variety of peppers even though I feel some may be late bloomers. I also noticed that the Manzanos had some ants on them and holes in the leaves but otherwise appear to be very healthy. With the big changes that have happened in just a week I cant wait to see what next week will bring.

 

[TedsFarms]

Nice looking plants. You do not have wind in your area? Curious now on the taste since they have been babied. I too have two separate batches. One in hydro and the other in soil. But they are not looking that good yet. lol

 

[crazy8]

Oh we can get some wind. With that storm the wind was so strong I saw a number of 30-40+ foot trees get pushed down and de-rooted out of the ground. Glad to see everything survived. Its also supposed to rain all the way up to Thursday so we will see how that goes. But my plants may also be somewhat sheltered from the wind being right next to the deck, having some tall tomatoes on both sides of them and some tall plants in front of them to.

 

[crazy8]

Just as a side note. I pass this house in my neighborhood on my way to work every day and this is just one of MANY trees you can find driving around that got blown over in the most recent storm. This tree was probably 30+ feet tall.

The rain was so blinding when my fiance and I were driving if it was any worse we may have had to pull over and wait for it to stop. She said she felt safe but I dont know if me having my Skywarn storm spotter cert helps at all...lol