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overwintering Office Overwintering?

fineexampl

fineexampl

A thought came to me. Would it be possible to overwinter my chilis at my office? Would regular fluorescent lighting be enough to sustain them through the winter? Light can get in my office windows, but i don't know how much. I'd probably trim them back top and bottom.

They wouldn't get much growth activity, but i could guarantee a constant temp and no frost. Maybe just one or two plants? i don't know. Hell, i could even leave my office lights on 24/7.

Anybody ever do this??
 
You probably want to give them very little light and let them go semi-dormant over the winter unless you want them to grow through the winter but then you'd probably want some good lights or keep it bonsaied
 
Is there a way to keep it growing year round by changing the environment like that? would i need to harden them off in the spring?
 
If you keep it growing, it will get awefully leggy unless you keep it well trimmed or use bigger lights. If you want it to go semi-dormant then you need to cut way back on the light and heat for the winter and then give them lots of light in the spring.
 
Funny how this thread had 0 views but 7 replies. Its working now
I give my overwintered plants a lot less light than my houseplants
 
So if i'm guessing correctly, trim them back a little, and move them to a location with some light, but not much? maybe i can make room under my desk in the living room. it gets some light, but not alot. i assume i would keep watering it occasionally? fertilizer perhaps sporadically?

Depending how this thread turns out, i may experiment. Bring one to the office and place the others in differing locations to see which does better. It could be fun. Maybe i'll have a Kapowie of my own next year. :)
 
I'm still deciding if I want to try to overwinter, or keep them inside and try to fruit them. Even if they pop out M&M size peppers, I don't care. I just want to do what will have the best chance of survival.

Overwintering can be tricky. I figure if I keep them around as house plants, at least I'll know if they're dying.
 
I'm overwintering, but honestly I spent alot on grow lights because I want peppers year round. Nothing beats a fresh pod. By the way, I'm FINALLY getting little buds on my pepper plants...YEAH!!!!:onfire: I don't see why you couldn't keep them overwintered done right though.
 
All of my plants are in containers, so what I plan on doing is bringing the Top Twenty or so inside if they have pods on them (and they are worth saving for powder or sauce - I don't have a clue how some will taste). They won't get lots of light but should get more than enough so that pods can finish ripening. Then, I'll trim them way back (give them a burr like Potawie does) and stick them in the basement, where they will get minimal light and heat. Not sure how much water they need - maybe a quart per week for a five-gallon container? Or just mist the stubs a couple of times a week?

One thing will be to watch for mites. Aphids won't have much to suck on, but the mites almost destroyed one plant last year.

Mike
 
Ive decided to overwinter 12 plants, by swapping 6 at a time out of my grow tent, which should be long enough to produce new flowers and pods.

We've probably had one of our more milder winters, we are getting to about 13 degrees celcius as a minimum during the day, but I'll only put the plants outside if its going to be 15+ during the day, then bring them back inside at night.

While I've had a heap of flower drops (to be expected), I havent had much foilage fall off at all, so the overwintering seems to be fairly easy from my perspective as long as they get 4 weeks under the HPS, every 2 months.
 
I've given up on actually growing peppers during the winter and have better success just overwintering. The aphids become too much of a problem for me when there is no natural predators in the winter
 
lights for over winter

1 18in flourescent will cover 2 6 inch pots with plants under 1 foot high.
To prevent any legging replace the bulb with a Actnic 420nm light from the pet store.
This frequency of light signals the plants to keep stems short by inhibiting the creation of a chemical.
Combine with a regular 18in flouresecent and it will make a nice compact healty bush in your office.
Or use the 225 led light that is out there but since it is mostly red lights it will be leggy no matter how close it is to them due to the stretching frequency of the 650ish nm red leds.
 
Nute said:
Or use the 225 led light that is out there but since it is mostly red lights it will be leggy no matter how close it is to them due to the stretching frequency of the 650ish nm red leds.
Click to expand...

I don't find this to be true. Whether its the 226 bulb unit or the 112 one, as long as I keep them close to the plants so they are getting at least 1500 LUX, they are not the least bit leggy.

Mike
 
I think everything depends on whether you just want to keep the plant alive over winter, or actually try to grow winter pods.
 
I have two hab's (I think they are habs heh) growing in small ish pots in my office building on a bright windowsill. They look 10x better then anything growing in my garden. The habs have baby pods on them just now, they haven't bloomed or anything yet.

I wonder how they'd do through the winter. I'm just going to leave them there... might add a couple more peppers to the windowsill and see if they do well.
 
POTAWIE said:
I think everything depends on whether you just want to keep the plant alive over winter, or actually try to grow winter pods.
Click to expand...
I'd prefer to just keep it alive so i can bring it back for the spring and get an early start. I have no desire to grow in the winter.
 
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