Nee's first pepper season. (Australia) Pics, vids & banter.. yey! \\(^o^)//

nee · Jul 3, 2012

Wow, what a mad few days here!!!
The company that market and promote the biggest viral video of all time "charlie bit my finger" are now handling all of the media requests i have been receiving from around the globe! I tried to handle them all myself, but there's just no way of doing it successfully on my own! We had the film crew from Channel 7 here today, and the story went out on prime time here in Aus, as well as various radio interviews during the day. I have lost count and can't keep up with how many site's are now running the story, but if you Google "9 year old ping pong tricks" then that may give you an indication as to how bloomin' mental things have been here in the past few days!!!! There's a great one from the local rag, The Geelong Advertiser here http://www.geelongadvertiser.com.au/article/2012/07/03/335391_news.html

Oh, and thankfully my grow is still going great!! They are probably benefiting massively from me not having the time to interfere with them every few hours as i previously did!!!

Oh, and we've hit the first milestone....with the video just getting over the half a million hits mark since Friday morning....

nee · Jul 5, 2012

OK, just got back to VIC from doing a live interview on Channel 7's Sunrise programme! Plants still doing real good! (phew!)

Here is the link if interested http://au.tv.yahoo.com/sunrise/video/-/watch/29884905/ping-pong-prodigy/

cbradac · Jul 7, 2012

That's awesome Neil.! He should try a few trick with 2 ping pong balls instead of one!

nee · Jul 10, 2012

OK, finally got round to potting a load of my babies up tonight....it was well overdue, but with recent events here i just haven't had a chance!

I've had a few brown spots appear after spraying them with very diluted vinegar to try and keep the fungus gnats at bay. I'm not overly bothered as they seem quite happy despite the small brown dots here and there. Plus i have noticed a drop in the number of gnats...but i might go down the hydrogen peroxide route again during their next watering...

Here's a few pics i took earlier....not a lot to report except they are growing bigger...and that i had a Dorset Naga pop up last week!

cbradac · Jul 10, 2012

Looking good!

Got myself an infinity and 7 pot douglah too. Bought a couple off ebay that I haven't had time to sow.

Saved myself a few months growing. Just getting them use to my grow room now. Cut back on my watering and fertilizing - plants are looking happy.

Question for you.. How's your power bill going with your current set up? How much power are you sucking with those fluro's?

I run a single 130w CFL in my room, but with the amount of plants I have in there - I know for a fact the there isn't enough lumens. But.. I'm not up for getting another light. Just cut back on the plants i have in there.

Chris.

nee · Jul 10, 2012

Hi Chris!

Ok, before I started growing my plants, we had always left a light on in the hallway at night,as we have 3 kids under 10 here, and if they needed to get up in the night, they could see where they were going etc. The globe we used was a 60w.

So when I first set up my grow lights, I used 2 x 35w flouros, which meant that we could stop leaving the hallway light on at night and just use the light from my grow box, which came in slightly over at 75w.

For a few weeks now I have been running 4 x 35w flouros, as I outgrew my original grow area....and as its only for another 8 weeks or so, until spring, it's not really a problem to us in doubling it to 140w.

As a comparison, we have a 42" LG LCD television, which with the kids around and mum at home during the daytime, is pretty much constantly on.....and that uses 190w.....so in the scale of things, my lights give me more pleasure than the tv, and at a lower running cost!
Hope this helps

cbradac · Jul 11, 2012

Yeah, that sounds alright. 140w. So roughly 190kwh per quarter, based on being switched on for 15 hours per day. Which works out to be around $47 per 90 days, which isn't too bad.

Mine is similar, but your set up cover a larger area than mine. Might have to look into getting long fluro's as opposed to my CFL.

Another thing, how often are you watering you little seedlings that I see you have there?

Chris.

nee · Jul 11, 2012

cbradac said:
Another thing, how often are you watering you little seedlings that I see you have there?

Hmm, probably every other day or so? Not sure really....just whenever they look like they're getting a bit too dry

Those in the latest pic are some 'sensitive plants' (the plants that curl up when you touch them) that i am growing for the kids....but i have a load of chilli seeds still yet to germinate. My Pimenta De Neydes took 92 days, so i've learnt to be very patient, even when it looks like nothing is happening!

JungleRain · Jul 11, 2012

Great work Neil, they're all looking healthy, keep up the good work

Trippa · Jul 11, 2012

Looking really good née you look like you are getting things set for spring well and truly. Nice!!

cbradac · Jul 11, 2012

but I must say, the plants are incredibly resilient.

The amount of crap that I have put on them in the past trying to 'over love' them and they have still come back.

love it!

Mezo · Jul 11, 2012

I think all of us can admit to over loving your plants "are you thirsty children?" (glug glug glug) "Are your hungry little buddies?" (burn burn burn) "what about a sun tan then?"

Mezo.

nee · Jul 11, 2012

That's so true Mezo.
The best advice I had was from yourself, and then echoed by Grant...to just leave them alone for the best part, and only step in when required.
Since adhering to that advice, I find I don't stress about my plants at all now....and because I don't chuck very nuts I can find at them, I can rest assured that if I get some brown marks on the leaves, then they are just "brown marks on the leaves"! ..and nothing to stress about...

Mezo · Jul 12, 2012

nee said:
I can rest assured that if I get some brown marks on the leaves, then they are just "brown marks on the leaves"! ..and nothing to stress about...

I often get brown marks Nee not just on my leaves, and your right its nothing to stress about. :whistle:

Mezo.

cbradac · Jul 12, 2012

nee said:
That's so true Mezo.
The best advice I had was from yourself, and then echoed by Grant...to just leave them alone for the best part, and only step in when required.
Since adhering to that advice, I find I don't stress about my plants at all now....and because I don't chuck very nuts I can find at them, I can rest assured that if I get some brown marks on the leaves, then they are just "brown marks on the leaves"! ..and nothing to stress about...

Very true. Since I've left my guys alone (all 50 of them). They're much better than they've ever been.

nee · Jul 12, 2012

cbradac said:
Very true. Since I've left my guys alone (all 50 of them). They're much better than they've ever been.

Hey Chris, have you started a grow log yet? If so, i couldn't spot it.....if not, GET ON IT!! hahaha

Oh, also tonight after watering the plants i had a quick peek at my seeds, as i still have a load that i got from Grant that i haven't germinated yet....and the temptation was too much to resist!!! haha
So i am currently soaking 2 varieties to put into Jiffy pellet's tomorrow...the first is Madballz 7, which apparently is mind blowingly crazy hot, and the second i'm not 100% sure what it is, but Grant suggests that it could be from a Trinidad Scorpion Moruga Chocolate that he was cutting up....
Whatever it is, i look forward to it's arrival!!

Also started off some strawberries under the lights for the kids. I'm really pleased at their interest in growing stuff since i started with the chillies, as my Mum grew heaps of stuff when i was little, but i didn't take an interest....whereas Maddy (7) is always having a look over the plants, and even discovered that the Manzano's leaves have a strong chilli smell when rubbed between the fingers and smelt,(like a mint plant) which is something i'd not realised until she told me!

Mezo · Jul 12, 2012

My parents had me digging & planting when i was around five i thinks (jeez wheres that 40 odd years gone?)
Start em young with growing & tasting the produce & that will kick them in to cooking later on, worked for me i love cooking.

I had a Curry plant growing in Perth, people used to come round & say "oh whats that plant Mez?" id say rub it between your fingers & smell, what do you smell? the look of bewilderment "its curry isnt it?"

Mezo.

cbradac · Jul 12, 2012

nee said:
Hey Chris, have you started a grow log yet? If so, i couldn't spot it.....if not, GET ON IT!! hahaha

Oh, also tonight after watering the plants i had a quick peek at my seeds, as i still have a load that i got from Grant that i haven't germinated yet....and the temptation was too much to resist!!! haha
So i am currently soaking 2 varieties to put into Jiffy pellet's tomorrow...the first is Madballz 7, which apparently is mind blowingly crazy hot, and the second i'm not 100% sure what it is, but Grant suggests that it could be from a Trinidad Scorpion Moruga Chocolate that he was cutting up....
Whatever it is, i look forward to it's arrival!!

Also started off some strawberries under the lights for the kids. I'm really pleased at their interest in growing stuff since i started with the chillies, as my Mum grew heaps of stuff when i was little, but i didn't take an interest....whereas Maddy (7) is always having a look over the plants, and even discovered that the Manzano's leaves have a strong chilli smell when rubbed between the fingers and smelt,(like a mint plant) which is something i'd not realised until she told me!

Hey Neil, haven't started a grow log as of yet. My fiance brought home a new puppy last night. (another cavoodle). So I've been pretty busy with the puppies.

I really want to start a grow log, but.. obviously it won't be a true grow log as I've already germinated all the seeds and potted them up and got them under light. Well, I do have a few seedlings growing on the heated mat.

Some of the varieties I have are.

Chocolate Hab
Red Hab
White Hab
Red Bhut
White Bhut
Chocolate Bhut
Purple Bhut
T Scorpion BT
Moruga
Thai Chilli
Jalapeno
7 Pot yellow
7 Pot Douglah
Fatali
Savina
Aji Limon
Paper Lantern Hab
Orange Hab
Purple Tiger
Red Rocoto

I think that's it for the moment. I have a large greenhouse out the back and a grow room setup. This is my first attempt at growing peppers, So it has been quite a learning curve. But definitely fun.

Hopefully get some time to start up a log over the weekend.

And yeah, I have noticed that the manzana/rocoto leaves do have a really strong chilli smell! mine are like that too. Chocolate T Scorpion? I haven't seen any of those around - would love to taste one or even grow one!

Chris.

cbradac · Jul 18, 2012

Here's a quick shot on my indoor plants Neil. (don't mean to highjack your thread)

nee · Jul 19, 2012

cbradac said:
Here's a quick shot on my indoor plants Neil. (don't mean to highjack your thread)

Hey, no problem at all Chris!! And looking fine & dandy there i must say!! Did you move your lights higher to get the pic or are they always up that high?
Oh, and couldn't help but notice the stack of guitars in the pic too

They're yours yeah?