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SeanW is back...and the hydro plants are all in!

What the heck, weather? 70 degrees one day, snow the next? 
 
Anyway, this year is going to be way stepped back from last year. We now have a 7 week old baby in the house, and between preparing for his arrival and actually having him here, I didn't get a chance to get any seeds started. They'll live happily in the fridge until next year, I guess. My garden prep also didn't really go where I wanted it, so there's that, too. It's okay, a scaled back year this year and spend what time I can this summer getting major work done on the garden and then next year will be rocking.
 
I think I'm just going to be planting peppers that I can find at the local shops, either Big Blue or Big Orange, or the local garden stores if they have some. I've started to see them crop up, I just need to give it another week or three to make sure we don't have yet another killing cold. It's only about 40 here today, but should be warming up next week. 
 
Anyway, I'm back! Any pepper season is a good pepper season, so I'm looking forward to seeing what I can get. 
 
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I refilled my shaker container with it today - I shall not be deterred! Only manage to aerosolize enough to give myself a good sneezing fit, but got it covered. I covered my garden in black pepper and garlic powder, the cayenne will be going down later. Hopefully that'll cut back on the munching. Thanks for the tip on Jeff's glog, I'll keep an eye on it. 
 
One of my soilless plants, the serrano, keeps getting dry. I'm not sure why it is, the other two are fine. I just have to keep an eye on it. I watered the hell out of it today, hopefully I didn't overdo it. For some reason it just doesn't seem to retain as much water. 
 
I've got some compost tea brewing, I need to add some molasses. Just some water with compost and kelp meal so far, with a pair of bubblers. No idea how to tell when it's good and when it's just dirty water though.
 
Woah! Nearly lost a baby, moved them to a heat mat to keep the chill off the other day, and it was almost 80 today and one seedling was completely drooped and flaccid. A bit of water and it looks like it's going to pull through.

Got the sprinkler system going today, I need to watch to see where it is hitting and see if I need supplemental water.
 
Runescape said:
lol, i think theres a thread with some tips on making compost tea somewhere around... Nice to hear your plants survived. 
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Yep, and I've been doing it alllll wrong. I'm away this weekend, when I come back, I'll try again.
 
The seedling I cooked lost it's cotyledons, but it's got a teeny little true leaf, and seems to have survived. The other one has some bigger true leaves (I need to get pictures), but only one rank. I might stick it outside for 15 minutes or so here or there, just to give it some fresh air and sun.
 
I posted another topic about the serrano I have, it might have some transplant shock. Blister suggested that I use hydro nutes on it, so I'll be feeding my coco plants with some of the general hydroponics stuff here or there. Between that and the stuff I have already mixed in, I should see some growthsplosions. 
 
I also need to pick up some molasses, I do see some bubbles forming on my tea, but it's not quite where I want it. I'll add some sugars and another small scoop of hot compost and let it rip. Then I'll have a tasty treat for my plants. I also may need to cover it, my container is kinda exposed to the sun.
 
Need to get the temperatures up here. It's been cool enough that the plants are just sort of sitting there. My squash is growing like crazy, though (as it does). I found what I believe to be pumpkins growing in my compost pile, so I pulled a couple of them out to see what they heck they were. I think it was from a pumpkin I shoved in there last November or December from Halloween. My beans are also starting to sprout. 
 
Got a bit more bubbling on my tea once I added molasses, so that got fed to my plants. I still have a bunch bubbling. I'd bet if it were warmer, and if I blocked the sunlight, it'd go crazy.
 
Coco plants got another shot of nutes. Monday was 1tsp floramicro, 1.5tsp florabloom and 1tsp CalMag+ mixed into a gallon of water, yesterday was the same but with the calmag replaced with a shot of molasses. I'll probably continue feeding them a few times a week like this, maybe not with the calmag or molasses. 
 
I need to change the water in my hydro plants, but until it heats up I'll probably just leave it, or at least change infrequently with the understrength nutes still.
 
SeanW said:
Need to get the temperatures up here. It's been cool enough that the plants are just sort of sitting there. My squash is growing like crazy, though (as it does). I found what I believe to be pumpkins growing in my compost pile, so I pulled a couple of them out to see what they heck they were. I think it was from a pumpkin I shoved in there last November or December from Halloween. My beans are also starting to sprout. 
 
Got a bit more bubbling on my tea once I added molasses, so that got fed to my plants. I still have a bunch bubbling. I'd bet if it were warmer, and if I blocked the sunlight, it'd go crazy.
 
Coco plants got another shot of nutes. Monday was 1tsp floramicro, 1.5tsp florabloom and 1tsp CalMag+ mixed into a gallon of water, yesterday was the same but with the calmag replaced with a shot of molasses. I'll probably continue feeding them a few times a week like this, maybe not with the calmag or molasses. 
 
I need to change the water in my hydro plants, but until it heats up I'll probably just leave it, or at least change infrequently with the understrength nutes still.
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Yeah... we just swapped cold, windy and dry for cold and rainy this week... Nothing for it but to hang loose and wait for things to finally warm up enough that the peppers are happy. My tomatoes are growing well at least... ;)
 
The weather is still crap around here...we saw some 80s this weekend, but we're back down into the 60s when the storms hit tomorrow.
 
I really need to get out and weed, I have a TON of weeds. Curiously enough, it looks like a lot of the "weeds" are tomato volunteers from last year. I'm planning on digging up a bunch of them and shoving them into pots, I already have the pots and soil in them, so why not. Otherwise, it's time to yank and dump. I've got a bunch of mulch ready to go in, I just need to find time to do it. Hopefully the weather allows me...
 
I'm still giving my coco grows a big "meh." From what I've been reading, it's hard for the plants to get regular soil amendments out of the coco, no idea why, so I'm having to douse them with hydro nutes periodically. Hopefully when the weather warms up, they'll take off.
 
Babies inside are about ready to come out, I've started to harden them off. They grew a fair bit over the weekend. At the last watering I gave them a full dose of hydro nutrients, which when combined with the temperatures they really loved. 
 
No pepper pictures, because I haven't gotten around to it. I need to fix that, I know.
 
I do have some interesting shots from this weekend, though:
 
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Urfa biber plants have gone into the hydro! Woo!
 


(um...stand on your head there, silly phone...)
 

Hydro basil is looking pretty good.
 

I think my nutes were off in the hab bucket - I had added it per the "rapid growth" directions, which gave me a short, super bushy plant. I've adjusted that for the urfa plants, and will be doing the same for the hab next time that I change the water. 
 
I have some massive weeding to do. It got a little out of hand, and then I've just not had time, so it's REALLY gotten out of hand. I started yesterday, hopefully I'll get more done today. The plant is to weed heavily around the plants, and then just rake under everything else into the dirt and mulch heavily over top. Otherwise I'll be out there forever.
 
I found a new friend in my yard yesterday:

 
Common Snapping Turtle, he was about 9-10 inches wide, and if you counted his tail a good 2 feet long. Gotta watch the tootsies if I ever decide to go wading in the neighbor's stream.
 
Short and super bushy isn't really a bad thing in the early season Sean... having a sturdy stem and low profile makes the plants more resistant to the brisk spring winds. As they grow out in natural light the internodal distance increases, and they'll look more normal with time... At least that's been my experience. Glad to see you got at least one Urfa Biber going this year.
 
Cool pics of the Snapper and military aircraft. Were you at an airshow?
 
Continued success bro'!
 
Yeah, the leaves on the hab were just a little smaller than I was expecting. Not a big deal, I guess.
 
I went down to VA to see my sister graduate, and my dad and I took the opportunity to jump over to Virginia Beach to see the VB Patriotic Festival, at least the air show segment. We try and hit up air shows every year, the one in Pennsy we usually go to I couldn't make (he went without me), so this one worked. I had never seen an Osprey or Raptor before, so it was kind of neat. I have a ton of pictures I still need to edit from this year and last year, I've been getting way behind. 
Other air show pictures are here:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/shaggywolf/collections/72157624704560893/
 
The snapper was a little startling, was walking along my garden when I suddenly spotted him. The kids across the street had a few friends over, so I asked the parents if they wanted to take a quick field trip. So, of course, I walk back into my yard with a half dozen <10 year olds in tow and suddenly realize that I have no idea where the 2' long snapping turtle went. Found him, showed him off (got him to snap a couple of times), then let him be. There's a stream in the neighbor's yard, and a swamp across the street, I've seen other turtles, this is the first snapper I've encountered though. 
 
Hopefully the urfa bibers will pod up in time and I can get seeds off of them. I know it's early June, but I'm already fearing the frosts! Who knows when we'll get them this year, the temps seem to have come up to closer to June normal, and that could mean either a normal rest of the year, a really late hot fall, or an early cool fall. We'll have to see.
 
SeanW said:
Yeah, the leaves on the hab were just a little smaller than I was expecting. Not a big deal, I guess.
 
The snapper was a little startling, was walking along my garden when I suddenly spotted him. The kids across the street had a few friends over, so I asked the parents if they wanted to take a quick field trip. So, of course, I walk back into my yard with a half dozen <10 year olds in tow and suddenly realize that I have no idea where the 2' long snapping turtle went. Found him, showed him off (got him to snap a couple of times), then let him be. There's a stream in the neighbor's yard, and a swamp across the street, I've seen other turtles, this is the first snapper I've encountered though. 
 
Hopefully the urfa bibers will pod up in time and I can get seeds off of them. I know it's early June, but I'm already fearing the frosts! Who knows when we'll get them this year, the temps seem to have come up to closer to June normal, and that could mean either a normal rest of the year, a really late hot fall, or an early cool fall. We'll have to see.
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My Mom lives out in Richmond, MA... and every year she has a Snapper that emerges from the brook below the house and roams the neighborhood looking for a good place to lay her eggs. The process takes all day, and she's oblivious to outside stimuli (beyond self-protection) until she's finally settled on the best place to make her nest. She always lays them in the same place every year, but makes the circuit of the neighborhood first.
 
I hope your Urfa Biber plant(s) do well for you this year. If you need more seed, let me know... I have plenty enough to share. Cheers!
 
So, just a shot of the two basil plants I have growing
 


 
Choppers for scale. These both were planted at roughly the same time. The dirt one is a bit perkier, the hydro one is twice the size (or, was before I harvested some for pizza). 
 
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