Trent's 2014 Grow Log - COLD COLD COLD

lucilanga · May 17, 2014

Catalog parts my foot! It's all porn in there!

TrentL · May 17, 2014

Devv said:
I was born too late, I was already 36 when I got my first PC in '94. I am proud of IT getting me out of auto-tech land, and that I'm self taught.

Sounds like you have things pretty wrapped up. I like the redundancy you have over the single mode fiber. 10 gigs is nothing to sneeze at. I'm gearing up for that between campuses, the fiber is already in place.

So what do you think of "cloud based apps"? It seems all the major software vendors are trying to steer people that way. I see why, it's to keep a constant cash flow versus selling an app and not seeing them for years, return business wise. But to me, it's a waste of bandwidth. That and the programmers need to keep their stuff in pace with the constantly evolving browsers as most is web based. At least in the education sector. Talk about support issues!

So how are your plants doing?

I got my first computer in 1985 - commodore 64. Couldn't afford a tape or disk drive so every time I turned it on I had to write programs to get it to do anything. Was a great learning tool; much better than the "dumbed down" crap we have circulating today. Anyway, a keyboard, 1 Mhz 6502 processor, and a TV adapter, plus a book "101 computer games" (which you had to type in all the code to play)... the rest became history...

Peppers are happy in the garage for the time being. I was shocked tonight when I went out to look them over - the Dedo De Moca grew 2 foot tall in as many days! I was worried that bringing the pots indoors during a heavy rain, they were 100% saturated with water - was afraid they'd drown (not having much light in the garage..). But no... good grief, they seem to be ramping up in size just fine and are retaining a nice deep green color.

Still cozy in the garage.

A "cooler" angle

Dedo De moca.. thing was not even 6" tall or so when I transplanted it a week and a half ago.

Giant Jalapeno setting a lot of flowers.

What "Foe" is causing this pattern of damage? Same thing happened last year when I put my peppers out, something went to town on the leaves. 1 week outdoors and *most* of my plants are showing this damage now. I've never seen what is actually causing it though, tried looking at various times of day AND night and never caught the culprit.

Underside

Never seen this weird black beetle thing before. Friend or fo?

Closeup:

Also a 7-pot Chaguana showing this. I had this same dark pattern of mottling on several plants indoors. They'd invariably drop those leaves. Nutes or mites or ????

Same potting soil and I haven't added any nutes in over a month, so if it's a nute issue it's just bad luck of the draw on distribution when I scooped the dirt out of the bag...

TrentL · May 18, 2014

That bug was ID'd; it's a species of Lady beetle I've never seen before here.

Might have come in with the last shipment of ladybeetles I ordered. (I just released 1500 last week)

Devv · May 18, 2014

I'd say the cracks are from wind. Mine did the same. Those fragile inside leaves just get torn up.

Not sure about the other plant , maybe sunburn, it was outside right?

lucilanga · May 18, 2014

TrentL said:
Might have come in with the last shipment of ladybeetles I ordered. (I just released 1500 last week)

How much for 1500 ?
I am asking this because over here ladybugs are expensive as crack, possibly because of low demand.
It cannot be that difficult to grow ladybugs..

TrentL · May 18, 2014

Devv said:
I'd say the cracks are from wind. Mine did the same. Those fragile inside leaves just get torn up.

Not sure about the other plant , maybe sunburn, it was outside right?

They weren't in the sun, and they were doing this indoors. I still have the ones I isolated from the rest of them growing in the basement. Whatever it was spread to about 10 plants so I'm thinking some sort of disease or fungus. Not happy to see it on one I transplanted since that means I didn't contain whatever it was properly. If it was a fungus or disease or pests, it spread beyond the two original that I found it on, and now has hit a dozen plants. (10 indoors and now one outdoors).

Definitely wasn't sunburn - they haven't seen real sunlight yet. They spent a week on the north side of the house in complete shade, sheltered from wind and sun.

The cuts on those leaves are way too precise and clean for wind damage. Something else is doing that. I would need to use a razor to make this clean of a cut.

lucilanga said:
How much for 1500 ?
I am asking this because over here ladybugs are expensive as crack, possibly because of low demand.
It cannot be that difficult to grow ladybugs..

Too damn much. I ordered off the web and with air freight to get them here alive, I dropped close to $200 on them this winter (4 batches of 1500 each costing me around $50 a batch).

Devv said:
So what do you think of "cloud based apps"? It seems all the major software vendors are trying to steer people that way. I see why, it's to keep a constant cash flow versus selling an app and not seeing them for years, return business wise. But to me, it's a waste of bandwidth. That and the programmers need to keep their stuff in pace with the constantly evolving browsers as most is web based. At least in the education sector. Talk about support issues!

Missed responding to this yesterday. Meant to but got sidetracked.

I can't stand 'software as a service'. It will breed complacency in the industry.

"OH we have you hooked for X a month now, and you don't own anything, so if you quit paying we pull the plug on you."

This equals = screw innovation we have your money and you are locked in.
The "big move" is coming up this evening.

Taking the plants from the garage, and lining them up on the north side of my 36' camper. They'll get some sun there in the evening, and be closer to the garden for next weekend's plant out.

PaulG · May 18, 2014

Have you had a hail storm or heavy rain? That looks exactly like the hail/rain
damage my leaves suffered last week; really clean tears and in some cases,
holes that look like they were made with a paper punch!

Some of my leaves get that same burned look when they aren't ready for the sun.
Even a little can affect some plants. I just cut them off. Do you have really strong
lights?

Devv · May 18, 2014

I thought they were already outside in the sun and wind.

Woot on plant out next week!

And I forgot to mention before, plants look great!

You mentioned isolating. I cut 2 tomato plants off at ground level this morning and removed them. They have something bacterial or virus.

TrentL · May 18, 2014

PaulG said:
Have you had a hail storm or heavy rain? That looks exactly like the hail/rain
damage my leaves suffered last week; really clean tears and in some cases,
holes that look like they were made with a paper punch!

Some of my leaves get that same burned look when they aren't ready for the sun.
Even a little can affect some plants. I just cut them off. Do you have really strong
lights?

We did have 4 days of thunderstorms. While they were sheltered from the prevailing wind they got SOAKED in a direct, heavy rain the day I brought them in.

I guess it could have been rain drops tearing through the leaves.

The lights indoors were CFL and moving them to a darker part of the grow room didn't matter; the old leaves dropped off, new ones grew in, and got the same symptoms.

This is the first one I've seen do it that has been outdoors. but it's the exact same symptoms.

Devv said:
I thought they were already outside in the sun and wind.

Woot on plant out next week!

And I forgot to mention before, plants look great!

You mentioned isolating. I cut 2 tomato plants off at ground level this morning and removed them. They have something bacterial or virus.

They were outside but in full shade. I sunburned the living hell out of my plants last year, so this year I'm pampering them. Gave them a chance to catch some indirect UV before putting them in the sun.

I'm really thinking that the issue is bacterial or viral, spread by aphids... It started a couple months ago on a Carolina Reaper, then a nearby Naga Morich got hit. Both lost their leaves and slowly recovered. But now I've seen the same symptoms on annuums (jalapenos) and other Chinense.

The leaves that grow in are fine for a bit, then get mottled and drop off again. I don't think they're going to survive - going to pitch all the ones showing the symptoms.

Devv · May 18, 2014

Do you wear gloves when you handle the plants? Just trying to figure out the why?

I do know I had tomatoes 2 seasons ago suffer from southern blight. Plant diseases can ruin a garden, I lost half the crop.

I never handle a sick plant without gloves, and change them before handling the next.

PaulG · May 18, 2014

You may want to check out stc3248 2013 blog. He had a mild mottle virus
that wiped out some of his plants in SanDiego.

It doesn't look exactly the same, but he has lots of experience dealing with
virus issues. I'm sure he'd be glad to give some pointers if needed.

Also, lost season we had a very heavy, long downpour and the pepper leaves
looked like they had been through a hailstorm - ripped and shredded. But the
plants responded by growing out tons of new growth.

TrentL · May 18, 2014

PaulG said:
You may want to check out stc3248 2013 blog. He had a mild mottle virus
that wiped out some of his plants in SanDiego.

It doesn't look exactly the same, but he has lots of experience dealing with
virus issues. I'm sure he'd be glad to give some pointers if needed.

Also, lost season we had a very heavy, long downpour and the pepper leaves
looked like they had been through a hailstorm - ripped and shredded. But the
plants responded by growing out tons of new growth.

Thanks I'll try to dig that up and check it out. Viruses scare me. Not much you can do about them except go scorched earth.

I'm not TOO worried about the giant shade leaves that are damaged; they'll lose those soon enough anyway (or I'll intentionally prune them to expose nodes to daylight, either way, they'll go away).

Devv;

Regarding gloves, no I don't wear gloves when working with plants. I know I *should*, but I like getting dirty. The amount of fun I've had in any given day is usually measured by how many dirt rings I leave around the shower drain that night.

I had a really nasty bought of Late Blight last year on my tomato crop. It didn't hurt production any (except for some sunburned fruit), but good grief it looked nasty. It ended up killing off 4 plants (they were about done producing anyway), and infected every one of them that I had out there.

I moved my tomato plants to a different spot in the garden this year, but as much as I tilled, it probably won't do any good. If the crap was still in the soil it's now spread through the entire garden.

Update:

My tomato that I "rushed" in to the ground without hardening (busted stalk!) has re-rooted and is growing like gangbusters. It's also got the distinction as being the first tomato plant to get FLOWERS!!!!!!

It may have been wounded, but digging that trench and laying it in there sideways seemed to have done the trick.

It has a little sunburn on some leaves due to not being hardened off, but nothing too severe. Really no worse for the wear, all things considered.

Note: I had peppers surrounding the tomatoes on three sides, and the blight didn't touch them.

Only pepper plant issues I had last year stemmed from my Irish Wolfhound running through the garden chasing a cat.

PaulG · May 18, 2014

Good that the tomato blight didn't affect your peppers. Both being
nightshades, peppers can catch the same diseases as the toms.

Jeff H · May 19, 2014

TrentL said:
Here's the truck.

Nice truck. Looks plenty big enough to pull that camper. Heck, you probably don't need a WD hitch with that beast.

Dirt day is coming soon for you. We've got better weather this week so everything should warm up nicely.

muskymojo · May 19, 2014

TrentL said:
The amount of fun I've had in any given day is usually measured by how many dirt rings I leave around the shower drain that night.

Haha... I love it. I'm the same way.

I agree with PaulG. The tears in the leaves look like they were caused by heavy rain. I've had the same thing happen many times. One year all my plants got pounded by rain and hail right after I planted them out and almost every leaf was completely trashed (or gone). I thought it was going to be a major setback, but the plants bounced back in no time and it was my best year ever for peppers.

TrentL · May 19, 2014

muskymojo said:
I agree with PaulG. The tears in the leaves look like they were caused by heavy rain. I've had the same thing happen many times. One year all my plants got pounded by rain and hail right after I planted them out and almost every leaf was completely trashed (or gone). I thought it was going to be a major setback, but the plants bounced back in no time and it was my best year ever for peppers.

Yeah the big broad leaves always seem to be early casualties. Seems that those are a self defense mechanism on the Chinense plants, to try to kill off / stunt any nearby competition, since the peppers don't really grow very tall very fast. (Sluggish as a glacier may be a better way to describe their growth habit lol)

Once they really start taking off though the leaf shape seems to change again and they drop those big ones off.

Whenever I see them damaged (severely) I'll pluck them off so the plant doesn't waste energy trying to repair them.

On the sun-side, I'll also pluck them off if they are blocking light from hitting lower nodes, to encourage branching out. Once the sun hits the nodes I usually get a bunch of new branches.

If they're touching the ground, they go, too, no sense in giving insects and pests a bigger entry point.

Speaking of pests...

Last year I had a corn borer tunnel down a Naga Morich and kill half of it. I noticed a branch all wilting, but no signs of breakage. When I squeezed the stalk it was hollow. So I lopped it off. It was hollow.

Split the branch and followed it up.. about .5" from the main stalk I found the frigging worm.

First time I'd seen one of those hit a pepper plant. Was an isolated incident but I know what to watch for this year.

(No I don't grow corn, no idea where it came from)

Devv · May 19, 2014

I have all kinds of bugs and critters but have yet to see that, and don't want to!

TrentL · May 19, 2014

Ugh. Found two more Habanero plants with mottled leaves today. Nowhere near the others, and NOT part of my grow! These two were traded for last month.

That rules out nutes AND lights, since they are in different potting soil mix and I haven't added ANY nutes since late March / early April....these were also grown in a completely different environment.

Shit.

That's about all I can say.. is "shit."

I'll take more pictures later when I'm not so pissed off.

TrentL · May 19, 2014

got the best pictures I could.. from a Nokia 924 cell phone w/ a 4x lens held over it.

Top

Bottom

Another leaf, advanced stage "whateverthehellthisis"

(This is what they look like about the time they fall off...the shiny spots are water droplets)

"Patient Zero"

(Carolina Reaper)

It has lost and regrown it's leaves several times now... each time they get a certain size, get mottled, and drop right the hell off.

Patient 1: 7-pot Chaguanas.

These seeds were from different vendors (Ed Currie, and Judy), so it's not genetic or infected seed stock.

Yes it's wilty, I've been neglecting my few remaining indoor plants since I moved the bulk of them out.

Note that it has lost and regrown a LOT of leaves, causing it to fork like crazy...
Patient 2 - Naga Morich

Truth be told I can't remember if the 7-pot Chauganas or the Naga Morich was the second patient, but we'll call this one "patient 2". These three were isolated from the rest on a different table and removed from any harsh lighting.

Anyway, it's lost and regrown it's leaves several times now as well...

kgetpeppers · May 19, 2014