Hello everyone!
After taking a very long (four season!) break from gardening to focus on work, I am FINALLY preparing to start back with my true love of growing things. My hometown is Jacksonville, Florida and that is the only place I have ever had a legitimate garden up to this point. I've been living predominantly in Austin, Texas since 2016 and have only had a little patio garden at our apartment for herbs, green onions and a four-year old habanero that I've kept alive for companionship more than anything.
I come from a long line of hot pepper gardeners that unfortunately skipped my mother's generation. I'm really interested in medicinal plants and I also love growing pretty flowers and weird vines. In 2015, I was able to meet a huge personal goal and produce all of the fruit and vegetables that I ate for over 6 months (although I traded for some things like avocado and ginger). That was also my first year making hot sauce and I have been dying to make more ever since.
Both my longtime boyfriend and myself are taking a break from our corporate work (we do insurance adjusting during catastrophes) and dedicating next year to personal hobbies, of which we have many. To facilitate these hobbies, we have gotten together with another friend (who is a professional carpenter/roofer/builder extraordinaire) to buy a piece of property out in the Texas Hill Country, which is one of the prettiest areas I've seen in this state that sometimes reminds me of a desert. So after a lot of searching, we finally found a really cool 32 acre property that is comprised of mostly a big mountain. It has access to city water and power which are already run pretty close, so that is a huge bonus! We have spent the last two months surveying and doing all kinds of things that are required by the seller’s agent/title company and yesterday we finally jumped the last hoop, signed the papers and bought the thing!
Everyone is really excited to get started. We are going to put up a big metal building and start working on a lot of common area things like a main road, irrigation, power, etc. Our lease on the apt in Austin is up in March, so we have until then to complete some first phase projects so that we can actually live on the property. We also have to make a big trip back to Florida and Georgia to see my family and Jeremy’s family for the holidays and wrap some things up there. I’m hoping to be back in Texas mid-December to get started here.
As far as peppers go, I have a pretty loose plan in mind. I know I will be growing in fabric pots, setting up some drip irrigation and keeping things organic. This mountain property is right on the line of Zones 8a and 8b and the elevation is around 2320 ft. There are some flat areas and I might make some terraces of sorts depending on where I decide to put the peppers. I’m going to be growing about 100 plants or so, maybe more. I haven’t grown out my seed collections in four years, so I want to dedicate some effort to that. Then there will be a huge group of pepper plants dedicated to the hot sauce. Still thinking up recipe ideas on that, so if anyone has any thoughts, let me know!
I will be getting some pictures together of the potential garden areas and will keep everyone posted as the season goes on. All I know is that this is going to be an interesting year.
After taking a very long (four season!) break from gardening to focus on work, I am FINALLY preparing to start back with my true love of growing things. My hometown is Jacksonville, Florida and that is the only place I have ever had a legitimate garden up to this point. I've been living predominantly in Austin, Texas since 2016 and have only had a little patio garden at our apartment for herbs, green onions and a four-year old habanero that I've kept alive for companionship more than anything.
I come from a long line of hot pepper gardeners that unfortunately skipped my mother's generation. I'm really interested in medicinal plants and I also love growing pretty flowers and weird vines. In 2015, I was able to meet a huge personal goal and produce all of the fruit and vegetables that I ate for over 6 months (although I traded for some things like avocado and ginger).
That was also my first year making hot sauce and I have been dying to make more ever since.Both my longtime boyfriend and myself are taking a break from our corporate work (we do insurance adjusting during catastrophes) and dedicating next year to personal hobbies, of which we have many. To facilitate these hobbies, we have gotten together with another friend (who is a professional carpenter/roofer/builder extraordinaire) to buy a piece of property out in the Texas Hill Country, which is one of the prettiest areas I've seen in this state that sometimes reminds me of a desert. So after a lot of searching, we finally found a really cool 32 acre property that is comprised of mostly a big mountain. It has access to city water and power which are already run pretty close, so that is a huge bonus! We have spent the last two months surveying and doing all kinds of things that are required by the seller’s agent/title company and yesterday we finally jumped the last hoop, signed the papers and bought the thing!
Everyone is really excited to get started. We are going to put up a big metal building and start working on a lot of common area things like a main road, irrigation, power, etc. Our lease on the apt in Austin is up in March, so we have until then to complete some first phase projects so that we can actually live on the property. We also have to make a big trip back to Florida and Georgia to see my family and Jeremy’s family for the holidays and wrap some things up there. I’m hoping to be back in Texas mid-December to get started here.
As far as peppers go, I have a pretty loose plan in mind. I know I will be growing in fabric pots, setting up some drip irrigation and keeping things organic. This mountain property is right on the line of Zones 8a and 8b and the elevation is around 2320 ft. There are some flat areas and I might make some terraces of sorts depending on where I decide to put the peppers. I’m going to be growing about 100 plants or so, maybe more. I haven’t grown out my seed collections in four years, so I want to dedicate some effort to that. Then there will be a huge group of pepper plants dedicated to the hot sauce. Still thinking up recipe ideas on that, so if anyone has any thoughts, let me know!
I will be getting some pictures together of the potential garden areas and will keep everyone posted as the season goes on. All I know is that this is going to be an interesting year.
