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Stickman's 2012 Gochu Pepper Glog

Well, here we go... Started about 35 Korean Gochu Peppers and a few Korean salad peppers, jalapenos and orange habs. All are mostly up today but the habs. I started them early last week in my heated grow tent down in my cellar on top of a grow mat, but didn't have the thermostat quite dialed in. When I left it it was 70 degrees f. in the tent. When I checked again the next morning it was 85 degrees, and I was afraid I'd cooked the seeds, so I moved them onto my kitchen windowsill on the grow mat and awaited developments. Looking much better now. I'll give the Habs until the weekend to pop, then move the flat down to the grow tent.
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Cut the plastic for the hoophouse a little too short and didn't fix it until about an hour after sundown last night. I put in a min/max thermometer at the same time so I can keep track of the temperature range inside. Ambient temp. at 5:30 am was 28 degrees... hoophouse was 30 degrees. Noontime ambient temp was 51 degrees... hoophouse was 105 degrees. I'll have to open the ends during the sunny days to vent excessive heat and close up in the mid-afternoon to trap enough heat for overnight. When I get overnight lows of 50 degrees in the hoophouse I'll plant the chilies.
 
Yesterday afternoon the wind picked up smartly and blew over my hoophouse. I'd removed the ends to let out the hot air and keep from cooking the peppers, but the wind got in there and pulled up the PVC pipe. It was so warm last night I left the cover off, and got enough sandbags today to anchor both ends of the hoops. Hopefully a sixteen pound sandbag at each end will be enough.
 
Oh man... it was like an itch I couldn't scratch! I was just under the hoophouse and see that some of the older chilies are already showing new growth and putting out blossoms. The pollinators can't get at them just yet, so I don't think I need to pinch off the flowers. The plan is to switch the 6 mil plastic for Agribon 19 in about 4 weeks, and letting them out in the open air 4 weeks after that. Some pix from today...
Big Jim Legacy
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Chimayo
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Numex Ancho
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Serrano
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Well, I'm glad I set up the hoophouse... Monday night the overnight low temperature was in the mid sixties, Last night it was about thirty six and the chiles look great. left the ends buttoned up until about 10:30 this morning and the temperature inside was about ninety when I opened them. Yesterday afternoon the wind was blowing briskly while I set the sandbags out but they seem to have done the trick. I probably could have used stakes to keep the sides down, but by using sandbags I can move them off of one side or the other and throw the plastic to the other side so I can get at the peppers and water them without crawling on my hands and knees the length of the hoophouse.
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Five days after planting outside and some of the peppers have grown about an inch. Even with the ends unbuttoned during the day the temperatures inside the hoophouse are in the nineties when the sun's out. We'll see what it's like when it rains... if it does. It's been pretty dry the last few weeks.
 
Some of those varieties you have are new to me can not wait to see their progress from the flower to the fruit stage. They look awesome and happy great job Stickman.
 
The weather has return to California sunshine finally and thing are looking great and recovering from the wind, heavy rain, and hail damage. I was going to update later today my growlog, since it sunshine enough to take pictures the best I can even with a snap shot camera I can not produce great pictures lol.
 
Hooaw! Finally got a half an inch of rain after a month and a half without. Things were so dry that most of it ran off judging from the way the streams came up, but more forecast for later this week and maybe then it'll soak in more.
 
Put Tomatoes out in the hoophouse today to keep the chiles and eggplant company. All are looking good. Planted Amish Paste Tomatoes and Sungold Cherry Tomatoes because I'd heard such good things about them. Windy, cold and overcast today and it was steamy and about ninety degrees inside the hoophouse. The peppers have grown a little in height, but mostly I'm amazed at how much the stems have thickened since I planted out there. Do you think the 27 pound bag of bone meal I added to the pepper plot helped...
 
That hoophouse is looking pretty awesome, I might have to try something like that next year. Do you plan on drying all the gochu peppers just for kimchi? never had one fresh, are they any good?
 
Glad you got some rain man...Your grow is looking real nice. Love the makeshift hoophouse! Can't believe you got plants in the ground already in MA!
 
Jay said:
That hoophouse is looking pretty awesome, I might have to try something like that next year. Do you plan on drying all the gochu peppers just for kimchi? never had one fresh, are they any good?
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Hi Jay
Yeah, I'm planning on drying all the gochu peppers that ripen. Last year I made ristras out of them and hung them inside the house behind a south-facing sliding glass door. This year I'm going to be growing so many that I'm going to make a solar drier with plywood, scrap lumber and window screen that has several drawers inside. If I make it big enough I should be able to handle the whole crop as it ripens. It'll be good for curing onions for storage and drying tomatoes too.
Like most cayenne-types, gochu peppers are pretty mild when green, but the kick picks up as they ripen. When fully ripe and dried I think they have a fruity aroma that reminds me of raisins mixed with the warm earthy smell of chiles. The taste is similar.. sweet heat, and the color in kimchi is a vibrant red.
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stc3248 said:
Glad you got some rain man...Your grow is looking real nice. Love the makeshift hoophouse! Can't believe you got plants in the ground already in MA!
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Hi Shane
I'm pretty ecstatic myself! We really needed a good soak and we got about half an inch spread out over 24 hours so at least some of it had a chance to really sink in. If the next one comes fairly soon the ground should really soak it up. I love the hoophouse. It's cheap, stows compactly and gets the job done. I used one last year on a smaller scale to start my peppers, eggplants and tomatoes, so I knew it would work this year at around the same time. The only minus is that the 6 mil plastic film I get from home depot only transmits 70 percent of the sunlight that hits it, and it isn't UV stabilized. It's really only good for a season or two before it gets brittle in the sun and starts to crack. I can't afford the greenhouse film... it's four times the price.
 
stickman said:
Hi Jay
Yeah, I'm planning on drying all the gochu peppers that ripen. Last year I made ristras out of them and hung them inside the house behind a south-facing sliding glass door. This year I'm going to be growing so many that I'm going to make a solar drier with plywood, scrap lumber and window screen that has several drawers inside. If I make it big enough I should be able to handle the whole crop as it ripens. It'll be good for curing onions for storage and drying tomatoes too.
Like most cayenne-types, gochu peppers are pretty mild when green, but the kick picks up as they ripen. When fully ripe and dried I think they have a fruity aroma that reminds me of raisins mixed with the warm earthy smell of chiles. The taste is similar.. sweet heat, and the color in kimchi is a vibrant red.
1stbatchkimchi2011.jpg
GochuGaru2011.jpg



Hi Shane
I'm pretty ecstatic myself! We really needed a good soak and we got about half an inch spread out over 24 hours so at least some of it had a chance to really sink in. If the next one comes fairly soon the ground should really soak it up. I love the hoophouse. It's cheap, stows compactly and gets the job done. I used one last year on a smaller scale to start my peppers, eggplants and tomatoes, so I knew it would work this year at around the same time. The only minus is that the 6 mil plastic film I get from home depot only transmits 70 percent of the sunlight that hits it, and it isn't UV stabilized. It's really only good for a season or two before it gets brittle in the sun and starts to crack. I can't afford the greenhouse film... it's four times the price.
Click to expand...
I did something similar using the same plastic...
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Hey it works!
 
stc3248 said:
I did something similar using the same plastic...
SD530662.jpg

Hey it works!
Click to expand...
Positootly! If you're ever looking to expand, 10 foot sections of half inch, schedule 40 PVC pipe are under $2 at home depot. If your place is as windy as mine, I got the sandbags for 75 cents apiece at our local farmer's supply.
Incidentally... is the side of your house stucco? If it is, have you thought about painting the side of your house under the plastic flat black? The stucco would have enough thermal mass to hold the heat for a while I think, or you could use a few five gallon buckets with snap-on lids that were painted flat black and filled with water for thermal mass. Black absorbs sunlight and radiates heat, thermal mass absorbs heat and radiates it when the sun goes down.
 
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