LHornR's 2023 GLOG What it is...What it was...What it shall be....

OK...let's see if I can do this.

What it is...

What it was....

What it shall be...

So 17 types this year as follows...THE LIST...

But first just a brief history on how I got to this point...OH quit griping...I said it would be brief!

I started growing peppers in 2021 because I was tired of paying $3.500@lb for peppers at the store for my chili. So I was like..hey I'll grow my own and save money...riiiiight! At this point with what I've invested in this hobby I could buy the store's yearly inventory.

So in 2021 I grabbed some Ferry-Morse Poblano and Anaheim seeds and threw them in the dirt. I ended up with a bumper crop and had so many I gave some away as much as I could but ended up throwing a lot away. I roasted, peeled and froze about 40+ lbs. With 14 plants or so I was getting pickins like this throughout the summer....

Sorry about the screen tear in that last pic.

So 2022 comes around and I wanted to grow Paprika peppers to make my own smoked paprika that I use a lot of and it too is expensive in the store...plus I found its very bland compared to home grown. So I bought Mosquetero and San Ardo Poblano, Big Jim and Garden Salsa Anaheim, Hungarian and "Boldog" Paprika seeds along with some 2021 Anaheim seeds I saved. I put the quotes on Boldog because they turned out to be Thai peppers instead...thank you very much Reimers Seeds!! I'm a lightweight so I cant eat the hot stuff...so I had 8 Thai plants putting out peppers I had no use for and couldnt give away...so I made pepper spray with them to keep the rabbits from digging in my yard.

The comes the heatwave of 2022 and even with 60% shadecloth over them the plants just kept dropping flowers and buds. I got maybe 14lbs frozen and 1/2 pint of smoked paprika last year. You can see by the grass it was not a good year for any plants. This was about the entire harvest in the first three pics...

And the Thai's...they did really well OF COURSE...this was just one pickin...had about 4 times this many...

That bring me to 2023...wow...I guess that wasnt so brief was it.

Anyhootchi....I started germinating seeds on 3/28/23 with the wet paper towel in baggies with seeds facing down. By 4/8 all of the seeds went into starter trays. Currently I have 48 Solo cups going now...but since I couldnt bear to throw any seedlings out I took the best ones and added another 10 solo cups. BUT...the extra Boldogs were doing so well I just had to save them as well...but I'm just going to throw the whole pot of them in a tote and see how they do.

I ran a test back in late February of all the seeds in which I took 3 seeds of each and germinated them to see how long each would take. Then I did the actual starts at different intervals accordingly hence the different start dates.

And fresh off the press today after a rotation and watering...

Still having frost and freeze warnings at night here so this will be home for them probably for a couple more weeks. I know I've probably left tons of info out or maybe too much...so lemme know as I'm a GLOG virgin. Thanks for watching and be sure to tip your cows.

 

[Mildfruit]

Wow looks really cool! Im envy of that drying setup. I laughed when I read that part about the reason you started growing your own peppers, I thought “oh boy I hope he knows” as I read on At least some in this forum are making money or loosing less money than the average grower, so it’s possible .

 

[Grass Snake]

Why do you grow all them peppers? Just use Rotel like everyone else. JK keep doing what you're doing. Hopefully you'll share the Chili recipe with us. Beans or no beans? If you say no beans I'm outta here!

Ok I see some beans thank goodness.

Good luck this season!

 

[LHornR]

Wow looks really cool! Im envy of that drying setup. I laughed when I read that part about the reason you started growing your own peppers, I thought “oh boy I hope he knows” as I read on At least some in this forum are making money or loosing less money than the average grower, so it’s possible .

Thanks Mildfruit....I actually bought that smoker chest for smoking and drying peppers. Of course I dont mind doing meats on it either. I'm almost finished with an additional side firebox for it so I can get a better cleaner smoke instead of smoldering wood chunks. Plus I cand keep temperatures a lot lower than with the gas smoker itself.

Why do you grow all them peppers? Just use Rotel like everyone else. JK keep doing what you're doing. Hopefully you'll share the Chili recipe with us. Beans or no beans? If you say no beans I'm outta here!

Ok I see some beans thank goodness.

Good luck this season!

I use about 7-8lbs of peppers when I make chili. Thats roasted, peeled, deseeded, skinned and chopped pounds. I make around 6 gallons at a time. I'd have to get the recipe into a post-able format but sure no problem. I'm not a chili purist by any means...in fact it eats more like a fairly healthy stew. And yes...2lbs of dry black beans...2 lbs of dry roman beans and 1 lb of dry chickpeas...for a texture breakup. Besides those the other main ingredients are 14lbs of grilled Eye of Round and 5lbs of grilled country store sausage. Never tried to post an Excel file..can that be done?

 

[Grass Snake]

Thanks Mildfruit....I actually bought that smoker chest for smoking and drying peppers. Of course I dont mind doing meats on it either. I'm almost finished with an additional side firebox for it so I can get a better cleaner smoke instead of smoldering wood chunks. Plus I cand keep temperatures a lot lower than with the gas smoker itself.

I use about 7-8lbs of peppers when I make chili. Thats roasted, peeled, deseeded, skinned and chopped pounds. I make around 6 gallons at a time. I'd have to get the recipe into a post-able format but sure no problem. I'm not a chili purist by any means...in fact it eats more like a fairly healthy stew. And yes...2lbs of dry black beans...2 lbs of dry roman beans and 1 lb of dry chickpeas...for a texture breakup. Besides those the other main ingredients are 14lbs of grilled Eye of Round and 5lbs of grilled country store sausage. Never tried to post an Excel file..can that be done?

Sounds Delicious! I'm not sure about the excel. That's a cool little firebox on the smoker. Did you make it?

 

[LHornR]

Sounds Delicious! I'm not sure about the excel. That's a cool little firebox on the smoker. Did you make it?

Yes I did all the piecework cutting and grinding then a friend of a friend welded it up.

 

[Ratatouille]

Nobody ever tells you the proportions this hobby can take on. It all starts so innocent.

Great read. I'm following along.

 

[Tinkerbelle]

Nice set up - I shall be following (not stalking ) with interest

 

[LHornR]

Nobody ever tells you the proportions this hobby can take on. It all starts so innocent.

Great read. I'm following along.

That's a fact...especially starting them indoors you have the indoor cost and the outdoor cost.

Nice set up - I shall be following (not stalking ) with interest

WHAT...they told me I would get stalkers here!! Thanks Tinkerbelle.

I cant be sure but I gave the peps a shot (1ml in 1 gallon) of Neptunes Harvest T&G instead of the Dynagro two days ago and the next day I swear they grew quite a bit overnight and got a deeper green. Might not look it in this pic today because I also thinned the herd with the cups with two plants each. I also rotated the outer to the inner.

I'm not sure about this one though. It has really deformed leaves but the one beside it in the cup is normal but smaller so far. What can cause the leaves to look like this? Its the only one out of all these peps.

By the way...what is the consensus of topping or not with this type of peps? Mainly Poblano's and Anaheim. I have topped them in the past due to the need to keep them short because of the wind here and I dont want to buy more stuff to make taller hoops for the shade cloth. What do you guys do with the larger podded peppers?

 

[LHornR]

Just a quicky update on my peps. Seems to be doing OK I guess. Definitely running out of room fast now but temps still in the 40F's daytime and 30F's at night. Last year I was able to get them outside on May 10th...so we'll see.

I'm also facing the fact I may not be able to keep all of these. I was planning on doing some of the smaller peps two per 7Gal pot...but I see ( and understand why) thats frowned upon. So I have 62 plants and currently 10 7G pots and 20 5G pots. I'm thinking of getting 10 more 7G pots and that for me is really pushing my budget....dunno.

Here is the current situation....

 

[Ratatouille]

If that's what you call 'OK', I'm curious about your 'great'.

 

[LHornR]

If that's what you call 'OK', I'm curious about your 'great'.

LOL...great will be when they are outside making babies.

I really need to get the materials together ASAP for the move to the outside world. I have leaves covering leaves now and the roots are starting to coil in the solo cups. It looks like I may be able to move them outside next week sometime. I'm kinda freaking out about what I need to recondition my media from last year and what brands are good...but I'll make another thread on that.

They are drinking about 2 gallons of water every few days now...and that's with it only wetting the media up to about an inch from the top.

 

[LHornR]

Well the days are finally here to get my peps outside..as soon as the coco coir I need for the soil mix gets here today. None too soon either as the plants are starting to get rootbound in the solo cups. Still have some nights dropping into the low 40's but I think they will manage.

Been putting them out during the day to harden them off...but even in the full sun all day I see no problems with them. I think maybe its because the grow lights have UV lights in them as well as hitting them with a strong breeze from the fan.


This was a few days ago when I did a heavy pruning of the larger lower leaves. They have a lot of growth started in the corners of the leaves so I want to encourage that growth to branch out. It was a little painful as about half of the leaves are gone for now.

And today as they wait for a new dirt home outside for good...

 

[LHornR]

Got the peps into their final pots Tuesday and of course the night time temps dropped to 31°F the next day. I tented then in my carport with a heavy tarp and put a heat lamp I had inside. It still dropped to 40°F inside the tent...but they did OK. In fact all week its been in the mid 40's here...along with 20mph wind gusting. I did loose one plant due to the tarp snapping it off when I was taking it down. BUT..I found these at my local nursery.

I'll just put the whole process up in a pic documentary of sort. Just got the hoops and shadecloth set up today. After mixing last years soil and everything I bought to ammend it...I only had enough for 30 7gal pots and 7 5gal pots. I had planned on at least 50...and not wanting to waste any of the plants I put two in a pot for most. I know it's not the best but at this point I'm outta money and back pain meds. So this is the current situation...

As they grow I'll have to spread them out and move some over to the side. Gonna go get my back on a heating pad and pass out now........

 

[CaneDog]

Awesome!

 

[Downriver]

Nice! Watch out for that plant under the dryer vent. Might get "dryer'd" out dead.

 

[LHornR]

@Downriver ..dryer vent towards the middle is rarely used...but the gas water heater vent at the end might be so I put up a barrier to block direct heat. The other is the furnace vent so that wont be a problem. I was even thinking I could enclose it all with plastic when it gets cold and the vents could heat the whole row.

Well most of the peps are starting upward growth now that they have been outside for two weeks and in rooting mode. The Mulato Poblano's are still lagging though. But even with those...I'm having to pluck lots of flowers off of the herd daily. Starting to get hot now so the lack of cold nights may help cut that back some. Most are around 12" to 17" tall now. As you can tell by the grass it's been hot with no rain at all. Called for rain today...never happened. I hope its not a repeat of last years heatwave.

 

[LHornR]

I figure it was time to check in here and give an update. I wish I had more time to play here but still too many things happening at once for me. I do keep an eye on everyone's post occasionally but just dont have time to sit down and respond...I do apologize.

Anyhootchie....we finally started to heat up here and get some much needed rain so it has lit a fire to my peps. Tons of flower's and tiny peps growing now that I'm not picking them off due to the cold temps. The one Boldog Paprika pepper I let grow is getting big...wont be long before it starts to turn red I imagine. From what I understand its not a very big pepper to begin with. Have a look see folks and thanks for stopping by.....

...and from left to right....

After I took these pics I moved some of the plants over to the side of the house and spread the remaining plants out to give them some room. I imagine in a couple weeks at this rate I will have to do it again....I HOPE!

 

[LHornR]

Oh yeah....I did manage to get some cumin to grow too so we'll see how that turns out. More of a test to see how it grows more than a producing crop though. I dont think it will have enough time to mature because it needs a long grow season and I started it on 6/01.

 

[LHornR]

Here's my first pepper harvest. Got about 10lbs and the plants are loaded for another pickin in a week or so. The 3 NuMex Heritage plants are loaded and will be picking in a couple days or so. Leaving the red's, black's and mulato's alone to ripen for paprika. The Charger peps are growing very large. The parchment paper they're on is 12"x12" for size reference. The Marconi's I cut because they got sun-scalded black somewhat. So basically peps for my next batch of chili.

My cumin on the other hand...well...not doing to good.