Kappy's First Grow Log! :D

JungleRain · Oct 14, 2011

Kappy, from downunder, were just coming into our season as your's ends,

good luck with your grow log

Nova · Oct 14, 2011

Yo forgitaboutit. Welcome!

Crusher · Oct 14, 2011

from So. Cal. Looks like you've got quite a few plants you plan to grow. I'm thinking you're going to have to invest in more lighting.

Pepper Ridge Farm · Oct 14, 2011

Kappy! That is quite a list to be growing over the winter months you're likey to run out of space very quick especially with only flourescent lighting. Have fun but save some seed to start mid-February for next years main crop. Great name you have!

Kappy · Oct 14, 2011

Hello Pepper Ridge Farm, Novacastrian, Jungle Rain, and nmorris279, thank you for the warm welcomes

Jungle, yay I'm happy your season is starting for you

Good luck with your pepper growing this year, may it be bountiful!

Nmorris279, yeah I have a lot for a indoor grow

but I have confidence I can pull it off, just takes some time and planning

Yeah I definitely need better lighting. I'm honestly a complete idiot when it comes to light fixtures, especially shop lights and such. I have the Fluro's knocked out, now I need to get some CFL's and just upgrade the fluros to more tubes per fixture. Any advice on lighting/which I should get at home depot would be much appreciated!

Pepper Ridge Farms, yeah I just couldn't wait for warmer weather lol. Well I actually started growing things in the June/July time, but I've been slowly adding on more seeds, too slowly though, should of had done it sooner D: But it stays pretty warm in my place and with the right lighting (eventually) I think I can pull this grow off

Space is indeed an issue, but I suppose its more that I need more table space or shelving to put my plants on. I've been trying to get some but I'm looking for cheap shelving. Eventually I'll replace the table I have with shelving as well. Looking forward to this challenge though

And thank you, I will definitely have some seeds left for Feb. Oh also thanks for the name compliment, though I'm not sure why its a great name lol

I'm still working on uploading the pictures, but they will be up soon. Thinking about it now.... don't laugh at my light setup! lol It looks.... well it looks like an idiot set it up hahaha.

I hope everyone is doing well, thanks for looking!

patrick · Oct 14, 2011

If you plan on growing all of these you're going to need a lot more room than the "little corner in my bedroom". I count 28 plants. Unless you plan on making all of them bonchi you should figure at least 2 sq ft per plant, and that's an extremely conservative estimate, your bedroom corner is going to need a spare 112 sq ft. That's about a 12' x 10' area. Then you're going to need more than florescent lights to get the plants to produce peppers. Floro's can grow some nice plants but you'll need some much pricier Hi-Intensity metal halide and/or high pressure sodium HID grow lights. That large of a space you would probably need a 1000 watts of power. I'm no expert on necessary lights so you should probably go to the grow tech forum and ask the pro's. I know the heat from a 1000W light needs to be vented or your bedroom is going to feel like a sauna.

I don't mean to rain on your parade but I think you're aiming a bit too high if you want to keep this simple and in a corner of your bedroom. Maybe one or two plants would make more sense. Good luck to you.

edit: I looked at your lights and they are exactly what I use to grow my plants from seedlings to about 12-15", big enough to set outside. I use up to 10 of them for that purpose plus a few 150W CFL's. They provide enough lumens to get the plants to bud and sometimes flower but they just don't put out enough to grow pods on a plant.

If you start the seeds now they'll be three feet tall and two foot square by the time you can set them outside.

Kappy · Oct 14, 2011

Ok here are some pictures.

This is the setup currently. It will get larger I just need more tables and shelving.

Some of my Ornamentals

From left to right, Pepper Pepperoni, Karneval Deep Orange, and a really old and dying Medusa that I'll probably be throwing out soon. I got about 300 seeds off of it though so I can always plant it again in the future

Here are some more ornamentals tucked back into the corner. From left to right: Chilly chili and Karneval Mix.

So in July of this year I had a packet of Burpee's All Alarm Hot Pepper Mix and I decided to put all the seeds into a pot and let it sit outside. I wasn't expecting much from it, it was just something new to grow at the time. But then a month later I got my first ornamental pepper plant, the Medusa, from a farmer's market and just instantly fell in love. I was amazed that peppers could be so beautiful and that they could grow on such tiny plants. That's when I got serious about this. So here are some of the pepper plants from the All Alarm Hot Mix packet. For weeks I had no clue which pepper was which, I was desperately waiting for pods to find out. 2 of the plants I kept finally started producing pods and I was able to identify it

Oh yeah, the plants could be these 5 different types, all annums: Hungarian Hot Wax, Anaheim, Large Hot Cherry Pepper, Jalapeno, and Red Cayenne.

My 2 Hungarian Hot Waxes

They've come so far! It still astonishes me those came from tiny little seeds. I'm so happy that I finally have some peppers, these are my first ones for growing from seed.

Kappy · Oct 14, 2011

So this guy I still have no ID for, but something tells me he's a Jalapeno. He's been setting off buds for a week now and today the first one opened

This is the bud that opened today!

These pictures were taken last night.

Here is another one from the hot mix with no ID yet. It is also putting off buds for me now

These are 2 more I have from the hot mix packet. I think they are both the same but I'm not sure. The one on the right is at 2 feet tall now, and both still have no flowers yet. That's alright though, soon enough I'll get some

So here are the little seedlings/some almost mature ornamentals.

Here are 2 Peruvian White Habs that seems to be doing pretty well. Both are producing buds at the moment

Not a great shot but you can see the bud

looks exactly the same for the other one.

Kappy · Oct 14, 2011

This is my biggest Explosive Ember that I've grown from seed. Looks like I'll have some peppers from him soon!

And here is a Prairie Fire seedling... it is 1 1/2 - 2 inches tall and it already has a bud o.O Is that normal?

These are all the photos I have for now but I'll continue to add more. I know my setup is shoddy, but it will get there. I'm also not looking to have a insanely crazy setup with misters and massive shop lights and stuff that will make my room go up like 40 degrees. I have the space to do this but my biggest concern is the lighting. I don't want to get too crazy with it since I live in a apartment and I don't have a ton of money (college student D

so I'm looking at the cheaper side of lighting, but I want to make sure I have enough lighting so my plants will actually benefit. Also I can't connect the lights to the ceiling, so I need to find some sort of device that will go around the area of growing and above it so it can hold the lights.

Thank you for looking! I'll get more pics up soon

Kappy · Oct 14, 2011

So a couple things I know I need to do soon.

-Re-pot plants. A few of them definitely need a bigger pot now, but most of them are flowering, so I've been worried about transplanting while this is happening.

-Get more lights.

-Mix up my own soil. I have vermiculite and perlite on me, I did have some coco coir but used it for other projects so I'll have to grab more. Is there an easier way of getting it than buying it at a pet store and hydrating it and such? Do places like Lowe's and Home Depot sell it in bags?

-Get emergency blankets to create an enclosed/curtained area for more incubation.

I want to point out too since I didn't mention it before that some of these plants were neglected for a long time. In the photo of the 2 tall annums (one is 2 feet) from the hot pepper mix pack, the plant on the left I left in a windowsill for a while that does not get enough light. It got no nutes, not enough water, and no air flow. The one on the right has been in my grow corner since I brought the hungarian hot waxes to the corner. All of the hot pepper mix plants were in a window sill for a long time, and I took only half of them to actually work with and take care of and forgot the rest. I just recently added the rest though and they're looking really good, though playing the catch up game.

Also a couple of my leaves have tears/holes... those would be from my cats. When they were still seedlings and in the windowsill, one day my cats somehow got into my kitchen and knocked of a bunch of the plants and chomped into a few. Its crazy the marks are still there from that lol

Some of my plants also have a mold/fungus right now from adding spent coffee grounds to the tops of the soil. I've been treating it with a gallon of water with a teaspoon of baking soda and about half a teaspoon of dish soap. It has been working great but the bottom of the stalks are suffering a little bit from it. I've been spacing out the days of spraying so they don't get too much damage.

Just recently I saw some fruit flys hanging out by my plants. Looked 2 days ago and I have a few little white bugs hanging out in the soil of some of the cups

I'm assuming those are mites. I've been using the same solution for the fungus with the mites and it seems to be working as well. Im going to create a better solution soon though of just water and some dish soap so I can spray a little more often for the lights.

Patrick, Thank you for the post/info

I do have the room to do this I think (oh I'll make room....), I just said something wrong about it probably. At the moment my grow space is only a corner because I haven't found the need to get bigger quite yet with what plants I have. Half of the peppers mentioned on the list are still seeds that were put into germinating conditions 3-4 days ago. So I'll start creating a bigger growing area now that I'll have more plants on the way. Also half of the plants I have in my pictures will be given away to friends and family soonish, so that will free up some space for me

I know I'll need better lighting and different varieties, I definitely want to upgrade but I'm still looking at what to upgrade to that is cost efficient, energy efficient, and I also need to create a structure or frame first to be able to support such heavy light fixtures. The lights I have now are pretty light weight and are being held to the ceiling with lots of tape and vegetable yarn/string so its working for my current setup.

No worries about the "raining on my parade"

I asked for advice and criticism and that's what I got, I appreciate that instead of being chewed out because I'm a noob lol (happens on lots of other growing forums

) I probably am aiming a bit high at the moment, but I suppose that's what makes this more fun for me, a even greater challenge. I'm currently an art student and my mentality is that I'm not limited, I just need to create a new solution/better way to use and work with what I have and try to somehow get great results out of that. I'm always happy to experiment and every "loss" is a lesson/experience learned.

I'm happy to see someone else has used these lights before though. While browsing through these forums I haven't seen them at all being used for at least the germinating/seedling stage until they get up to like you said about 12-15 inches. 10 of them, that's a lot

I was wondering when my cut off of those kind of lights would be and when I would actually upgrade them to something better. I think it will have to be before I get to 10 of those though with my setup lol.

Thank you for the advice Patrick, it is much appreciated!

PIC 1 · Oct 14, 2011

Man those are some amazing size plants for the size shoe they're in!

Re-pot as you know and they'll really take off...

Good luck with the grow.

Kappy · Oct 16, 2011

Thanks PIC 1!

I was wondering, should I just move them into 5 gallon buckets at this stage or something smaller for my larger plants? (mainly the ones from the all alarm hot packet)

PIC 1 · Oct 16, 2011

Kappy said:
Thanks PIC 1! I was wondering, should I just move them into 5 gallon buckets at this stage or something smaller for my larger plants? (mainly the ones from the all alarm hot packet)

You might want to check out Home Harvest Garden Supply, I would move up to the 3qt. size containers.....that should last for awhile

Do you plan on growing your plants indoors thru the winter? I've gone as far as 3 gal indoors, any larger and I'd end up with less plants..........

Kappy · Oct 16, 2011

Ahh ok thank you PIC 1, I'll have to check them out. Yup I plan to grow them through the winter, my place becomes a sauna usually during winter months because the apartment building I'm in uses the steam radiators or w/e, and so I usually find myself having to open a window or 2 to let some heat out. So I think my plants will be just fine

I suppose I need to start making some measurements and such to see really how much room I have available and what can go into the available space.

patrick · Oct 16, 2011

Glad you took what I said as constructive Kappy, that's how it was meant. Please take what else I say as trying to help too.

There are a lot of issues that you're going to have to take care of. First off lets talk about safety. Masking tape and string is not the way to hang lights. I know you said you needed to work on that and it should be the first thing you do. Florescent lights contain Mercury and although the amount is very small it doesn't take much to screw life up. Measure out the space you're going to use, figure out the type and number of lights you're going to need and get it done. Your time, effort and money should not go anywhere else until that is done. Good grow lights are expensive, hundreds of dollars so be prepared.

I've been doing this for many years and I finally broke down and bought a light that should be able to keep a single pepper plant producing indoor through the winter. It listed for $90. I built a frame for it out of PVC pipe which is pretty cheap. It takes up about a 5' x 5' space. You can see it in my grow log.

Good luck.

Kappy · Oct 18, 2011

Hey Patrick thanks for looking again!

Thank you for being concerned for the safety of myself and my babies

Agreed, the tape and string method is not a safe method. In fact the first time I was getting the lights up, I left the room for 10 minutes after I was "finished", came back to check and a string to one light had already fallen. No damage was done luckily, but it could of had happened and could of had been bad. After that I went back up and used duct tape and also a putty to make sure it definitely stays. It's been about 2 weeks now and everything is safe and sound, nothing has moved at all

The lights are pretty lightweight surprisingly. But even still, I do want to get those down from the ceiling asap and make a setup that they can attach to, just to make everything look better, to give my plants the most proper growing conditions, and to make my grow a safe one. I went to Home Depot over the weekend to take a look at shop lights and pvc. I also got some more buckets for transplanting my plants. I'll hopefully be able to begin my pvc setup soon, it will basically look like yours Patrick but with a couple different pieces. The shop lights though... all the shop lights I found at home depot were 4 feet long and higher. I was reluctant to do anything about lights yet because I don't have my space set up yet how I truly want it, and maybe with the new setup I'll be able to use 4 foot lights instead of 2 foot. At the same time, that's a lot of power. So still working out my light situation. For now though I'll probably pick up another one of the Walmart grow lights or 2 until my new setup is complete.

And for a small update on my plants... the ornamentals are doing alright, they still have lots of flowers and such. My larger plants though are having a tougher time. They are still growing strong, but their buds are starting to just shrivel up and die before they even open. I'm fairly sure this is happening though due to the recent temps here. It's been getting into the 40's (Fahrenheit) and my landlords have yet to put the heat on. I picked up some small portable heaters to try to heat up the room at least the peppers are in, but unfortunately its been burning out my fuses left and right, so I've been trying to find a happy medium. I've also been utilizing my oven... just put it on and crack it and let it heat up the place a bit.

Oh also, the seeds that I had put into germinating conditions are all about 75% done. I keep them in cups with plastic wrap on top and a wet paper towel inside, and then I set them on top of my fridge. 2 days ago was the first day I started to turn my oven on to heat up everything. That morning I checked all the cups and I didn't have a single sprout yet. I checked them that night as well just out of curiosity and impatience and over half of them had sprouted due to the oven being on. So 5 days to germinate, this is including the 55 hours of a water soak that I did with them first. Even some of my harder to sprout seeds have sprouted, like my habs. So if anyone wants to test it out for themselves/are having a hard time germinating their seeds, just turn your oven on for a day to like 300-350 degrees, leave it cracked, and after a couple hours of it being on go check out your seeds and see if they have done anything. With that in mind though, always periodically check your oven, never leave a open oven that's on completely unattended. I know a lot of us know this, but just in case...

Lots of work to be done this week now with transplanting plants/seedlings and setting up the new area. I'll post some pictures of everything soon

Thanks for looking!

nicksmurf111 · Oct 23, 2011

Are you still shopping for lights? If your on a budget, just get whatever 4ft shop light fixtures you can afford. Shop lights are the best bang for your money. You can use cool lights for starting seeds, but you may want some grow lights to encourage blooming. I actually acquired some used 4ft 4-tube fixtures (magnetic ballast) and run 2 of them hung from my basement ceiling to start seeds (40 watts X 8 tubes = 320 watts). Any shop light manufactured in the last couple years will have an electronic ballast in them; The tubes will burn brighter and longer. If I were growing plants year-round under lights, then I'd probably get something nicer...

Ask all your handy friends who keep junk around, they might just have extra fixtures laying around. Those little Walmart grow lights aren't worth the money. You'd be better off stringing up some compact fluorescent "daylight" bulbs than getting those ones like you have in the picture.

I'd post a picture of the shop lights strung to the ceiling, but I don't want to "steal" room on your thread.

-Nick

Kappy · Oct 23, 2011

Hi Nicksmurf111!

Yup still searching for lights. But I had to alter my setup first before I did that to see what size lights I needed. I actually just fixed everything the other day and I need to post some more pictures up soon. I'm doing a shelving unit setup now and they are each 28 in wide, so if I put them together I could get 4 foot shop lights. I actually bought a 2 foot light strip with T5 lightbulbs the other day at home depot for 25 bucks but It has no power cord with it and I'm having a really hard time figuring out how to put it together to get it to work >.< I'm not really good with technical things with lighting unfortunately

I'd love to see a picture of your lighting if you want to post it ^^ But yeah you're definitely right, I do want to keep this going year round so I need better lights that will supplement good growth and good flowering.

If anyone could help/provide a link... I think I'm going to order some lights online because I was really overwhelmed when I was looking at them all at home depot and the person I had helping me didn't know too much about them... For now I'm looking for 2 four foot grow lights or 4 two foots that come with the bulbs I need. The only fixtures I saw at home depot had only up to 2,600 lumens (fluorescent) and I'm looking for 6,500 I believe. I'm looking for a good deal and something that doesn't take a ton of power. I'm also not looking for anything where I have to do a bunch of wiring, something that just plugs into an outlet and I can hang up with chains. Any help is very much appreciated ^^

gnslngr · Oct 23, 2011

Kappy said:
Hi Nicksmurf111!

Yup still searching for lights. But I had to alter my setup first before I did that to see what size lights I needed. I actually just fixed everything the other day and I need to post some more pictures up soon. I'm doing a shelving unit setup now and they are each 28 in wide, so if I put them together I could get 4 foot shop lights. I actually bought a 2 foot light strip with T5 lightbulbs the other day at home depot for 25 bucks but It has no power cord with it and I'm having a really hard time figuring out how to put it together to get it to work >.< I'm not really good with technical things with lighting unfortunately

I'd love to see a picture of your lighting if you want to post it ^^ But yeah you're definitely right, I do want to keep this going year round so I need better lights that will supplement good growth and good flowering.

If anyone could help/provide a link... I think I'm going to order some lights online because I was really overwhelmed when I was looking at them all at home depot and the person I had helping me didn't know too much about them... For now I'm looking for 2 four foot grow lights or 4 two foots that come with the bulbs I need. The only fixtures I saw at home depot had only up to 2,600 lumens (fluorescent) and I'm looking for 6,500 I believe. I'm looking for a good deal and something that doesn't take a ton of power. I'm also not looking for anything where I have to do a bunch of wiring, something that just plugs into an outlet and I can hang up with chains. Any help is very much appreciated ^^

Where there is a will ,there's a way.....welcome to the forum by the way.Enthusiasm is contagious-so keep it up!It will take a while, but most of the info you seek is already here...there is a section concerning lighting etc-so don't wait on info you're lookin' for in a hurry.I was here 2 months before I realized there were more sections below hot peppers and the growing forums.I feel like I was able to get several seasons worth of knowledge here in the first few months-lots of help here, and not much "flaming"(don't believe I've seen ANY actually).Good luck, and the name thing,hehe-check out Pepperidge Farms profile, you'll understand :dance:

cheers and beers-
Dave