KingLeerUK GLOG 2015 - "time to make the powders"

Prologue
 
"Our hero, battered from the trials and frustrations of the 2014 season had originally determine that there would not be a sequel to his story.  2014 was a terrible year, between the torrential and unending rains of March-May, the unrelenting whiteflies, the brown spot, and the zombie aphids that continually arose from the dead to plague again and again...
 
Pair this with a busy race schedule for the Fall and extended family drama: our hero decided to sit 2015 out.
 
Alas, a decision was made to "plant some of my overwinters and a few tomatoes" and like a phoenix, the pepper-growing bug struck again.
 
Sit back friends and revel in the continuation of our story..."
 
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2014 was a terribly growing year for me, and probably most of Central Florida.  I originally was going to give the garden a pass for the year but I somehow had about 20 overwinter survivors in 7" pots that I ultimately decided to give a chance in-ground.  I did spend a weekend in early March amending the soil with mushroom compost, several bags of peat moss, about 20 bags of Black Kow, and 25 pounds each of vermiculite and perlite.
 
Last year my big motivation killer after all of the disease and pests was... WEEDS.  So, this year I invested in a few loads of cypress mulch and a weed barrier.  It's not 100% effective but it's drastically cut down on the weed forest I had from l last year.
 
During plant out I lost my single Aleppo and felt compelled to start some new ones from seed.  If you're going to start a few seeds you might as well  start 25, right?
 
The Grow List - any listings with (ow) designate as overwinters
 
7 Pod Brain Strain Yellow (ow)
7 Pod Jonah (ow)
7 Pod Primo (ow)
Aji Amarillo
Aji Cito
Aji Oro Rocoto
Aji Verde
Aleppo
Alma Paprika
Aribibi Gusano Orange (ow)
Barrackpore 7 Pod (ow)
Bhut Jolokia Red (ow)
Bishop's Crown (ow)
Brazilian Starfish (ow)
Carolina Reaper (ow)
Cayenne Long Red (ow)
Cherry Bomb Red
Chinese Bullet Pepper
Çumra Cherry
Datil (ow)
Devil's Tongue Red (ow)
Douglah (ow)
Dulce Marrón
Ethiopian Brown Berbere
Giant Jalapeno (ow)
Golden Cayenne
Kung Pao
Matay
Naga Morich (ow)
Naga Viper (ow)
Negro Chilhuacle
Orange Rocoto
Purple Carolina Reaper (ow**)
Purple Jalapeno
Red Habanero (ow)
Tatli Top
Trinidad Scorpion Moruga
Yatsufusa Pepper
 
** the "Purple Carolina Reaper" was a Carolina Reaper plant I had from last year that produced some very magenta-red pods, some with stunted tails and others with no tails at all.  I did save some seeds.  There is still a bit of mystery behind this one so we'll see how it pods out this year.
 
This GLOG won't be all-inclusive for the year to date.  I'd even debated the utility of keeping a GLOG this year but everything has been SO productive and the weather and pests have been very amenable so far; it may very well be my best year yet!

A few recent pictures:

Naga Morich
 

7 Pod "Brain Strain" Yellow
 

This MONSTER Trinidad Moruga Scorpion, in-ground overwinter, over 4' across, 2'+ tall

Naga Viper - I still can't get over how dark the foliage is on this plant
 

Unorthodox (drastic measures) tomato staking method
 

Laugh all you want... my tomatoes are over 5' tall already, the Lemon Pear tomato is cruising for 7'
 

Golden Cayenne
 

Brazilian Starfish - a few are starting to turn yellow

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KingLeerUK will return in a future post...

 

 

[JoynersHotPeppers]

Looking good

 

[LA 2 the Bay]

May the chile gods smile upon you

 

[mpicante]

Glad to hear things are looking good for you this year.Plants look really nice.With tomato plants that BIG there is no reason to laugh.Good job friend.

 

[KingLeerUK]

Bonus round:

7 Pod Primo - with a funky 90° upturned tail
 

One of my 3 Carolina Reapers is podding up nicely
 

Seedlings on the light table.  Some are a little bit leggy but I will address that with deep-planting on the next potting up.
I'll need to do some savage culling also.

 

[moruga welder]

looking great !   

 

[SL3]

Looks like your in for a great year! 

 

[KingLeerUK]

A few more pictures I grabbed after getting home today:
 

Naga Viper, 1 of 3 I have this year
 

Another Carolina Reaper going bloom and pod crazy.
 

No pods as yet, but this is a 7 Pot Barrackpore is full bloom.
 

Brazilian Starfish on the left, 7 Pot Brain Strain Yellow on the right
 

Some of my seedlings are showing curled leaves with yellow edges.  My light table is in the garage and it does get warm in there during the day (probably 85'F or so).  I haven't noticed any pests and the table is well off the floor.  Could this be heat damage, over watering or a nutrient deficiency (Ca and/or Mg)?

 

[KingLeerUK]

I sometimes wonder if these GLOGs get read all that often...

In any case, another week and things are still progressing nicely.  Central Florida continues to be quite hot and humid (upper 80's for temps and humidity swinging between 50% - 90% depending on the hour).  We haven't had hardly any rain for over a month now so I've been watering the garden every 2-3 days.
 
This weekend I mixed up a batch of humic acid concentrate (at 1 tsp/gallon) and dosed each of the plants with it.  I also did a 1Tbsp top dress of Azomite powder and a teaspoon of Epsom salts.

I planted out the final 3 overwinters: a red habanero, another Douglah and a Red Devil's Tongue.  The RDT has been particularly vigorous and even had fully-ripe pods on while in a neglected 7" pot.
 

A fully-ripe scorpion.
 

Ever-larger Brazilian Starfish pods
 

Golden Cayenne
 

7 Pot Jonah
 

The interior of a Red Devil's Tongue, I'd say slightly hotter than a standard red habanero.

 

[Hybrid Mode 01]

     Looking good for a glog that almost wasn't!

 

[KingLeerUK]

It's finally started raining again here in Central Florida.  I can only hope that we don't immediately go in to a period of "rain every afternoon and all night" like we had in April-May 2014 which ended up ruining most of my grow with brownspot. For now, the lawn is at least celebrating.
 
On to the progress update and pics!
 
Even after all of the superhot pods and robust growth on everything else, I am unreasonably excited about this: 
 

 
My first Bishop's Crown pod.
 
The short story is: I've been trying to grow these unsuccessfully now for THREE years.  The first few years I received bad seed (first time Amazon, second time a trade) and then finally at the end of last year I had some successful germination with seeds from pepperlover.com  But the saga doesn't end there.  I went in to winter 2014-15 with 5 plants to overwinter and lost 3 of them along the way to cold and pests.  The final  two actually looked pretty pathetic and I was about to throw in the towel on them but they have perked up and seem to be doing pretty well after planting out 6 weeks ago.
 
You'd think I was trying to grow some exotic wild.
 
 

 
The Naga Morich has decided that normal-sized pods are just too boring and has now started to grace me with these monsters.  I don't even want to think about how hot a mouthful that will be.
 
 

 
Somebody flipped the ripen-switch to Ludicrous Speed for my Morgua Scorpions; they have gone from one ripe pod to 5 in just a few days.
 
 

 
7 Pot "Brain Strain" Yellows - so.many.pods.  some of them rather large.  The plant seems content to keep them all green and increase their size which is fine with me for the moment.  This is my first year with this particular variety and I've watched a few pod test videos to try and get some idea what to expect.  Hint: utter gastronomic devastation.

 

[santis00]

Looking good, and I read them. to learn and get envious!

 

[parker49]

Looking realy good.  I'm definitely a little jealous as well, I wish my plants were that far along, but i'm further north so a good bit behind you.  Just starting to get flowers on my chinenses. 

 

[sirex]

You been getting the rain I been getting this last couple days? Forecasted for up to Tuesday everyday.

 

[Spicegeist]

Great looking peppers!

 

[KingLeerUK]

Thanks for the encouragement guys.  I wish I had more exciting or extensive updates to give but things are sort of mundane at the moment.  All of the plants are putting on nice foliage and appear to be very healthy.  I've got pods in varying stages on most of my plants with a few of my supers finally getting multiple ripe pods.  My plan is to do as large a harvest as I can the first time around and then dehydrate for either powder or flakes and store in airtight containment.
 
I'll have a more thorough visual update at the end of the weekend, for now this was a quick pull harvest to share at the office this morning; nothing fancy, just perfectly ripe and shaped.
 

 

[KingLeerUK]

As promised, a bit of visual update to close out the weekend:
 
 

Rather large Naga Morich pods, I suppose these are ready... I'm not.
 
 

7 Pot Brain Strain Yellows becoming... yellow.  It won't be long now.
 

Did I mention that this plant has something like 30+ pods on it?
 
 

The Bishop's Crown developing it's distinctive lobes.
 
 

7 Pod Primo with a wicked looking tail.
 
 

Carolina Reapers are turning over from green straight to red, as they always do.
 

This Reaper is nearly full-ripe.  My body is NOT READY.
 
 

Just a reminder kids, the one on the bottom is 200x hotter than the one on the top.

Datils!  The real deal in Florida.

 

[ribbedturtleneck]

Looking great. Keep up the good work.

 

[KingLeerUK]

4 pods from a single node on this Primo
 
 

Now I'm starting to get some extra-spiky lobed Brazilian Starfish
 

There are so many pods on this plant that it's drooping to the ground; I'll need to stake it.
 
 

Fully-ripe Reapers keep coming.
 
 

Extremely lobed Bishop's Crown

 

[jcw10tc]

Everything looks great.  Those yellow brains in particular look awesome.  Love that pepper.  Mine were great last year and very productive.