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Turbo 2015 Pepper Growing: Keeping It Simple (Stupid)

I've been procrastinating a bit this year, and just got around to starting my seed germination.  Last year, I picked just a few varieties and grew 4-6 plants of each variety.  I realized that if a plant does well, one plant would give me more than enough peppers, so this year I decided to go the other way.  I'm growing 17 varieties, but only 1-2 plants per variety, with the exception of Maule's Cayenne which I'm growing 6 plants (I never have enough cayennes).

My final grow list for 2015:
I'm also taking a different approach to growing this year.  KISS, or keeping it simple (stupid).  Last year I played around with a lot of "stuff": germinate seeds in coffee filters vs paper towels, mixed my own soil for each transplant, topping, trimming leaves, cutting early buds off, different kinds of pots once the plants are outside, etc.  This year I'm gonna try and make the process as simple as possible.  I'm just soaking the seeds over night in water then putting them in peat pods for germination.  I'm using Fox Farm's products for soil.  No topping, trimming, or pinching.  And all peppers are going in raised beds.  We'll see how the simple method works for me.
 
All my seeds soaking over night.  I have a germination heat pad, with a towel on top of it, and the seed tray on the towel so the seeds don't get too warm
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Here is the germination pod try I'm going to try this year
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I know I said I was going to try and keep things simple, but I couldn't help myself when I saw this.  Its a thermometer / humidity reader for the germination tray.  Hopefully this will allow me to keep better humidity control of the seedling environment.  Besides, I'm a data geek
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Nice list! I've been looking up Aji Peruvian but haven't found much information on it -- do you know much about it? I'm using a similar one plant per variety strategy but this'll be my year to trial a bunch of methods. Did you find anything that worked particularly well? Wish I could find Fox Farms here.
 
reader said:
Nice list! I've been looking up Aji Peruvian but haven't found much information on it -- do you know much about it? I'm using a similar one plant per variety strategy but this'll be my year to trial a bunch of methods. Did you find anything that worked particularly well? Wish I could find Fox Farms here.
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It'll be my first year to try the Aji Peruvian.  All I know about them is what I read on PepperLover's site.  I've really liked the Aji peppers I've tried so far, and I've been looking for ones that have a good sweetness to them, so I figured I'd give it a shot. 
 
I played around a lot last year with different techniques; topping, trimming, pinching buds, and good ole fashioned leave the plant alone.  My best plants were the ones I just left alone.  I also experimented with burying 2 liter bottles filled with water between each plant about 2/3 deep.  The theory was that the sun would warm up the water during the day and the water would keep the soil warm at night.  I did half my raised bed with these bottles, and half without.  The plants with the bottles were bigger (though they were also different varieties than the other half), but their root structures were more developed as well.  So I'll keep doing that one.
bpwilly said:
Even when you try to keep it simple, there is nothing wrong with letting yourself have a few goodies.  Otherwise this would be to much like a job rather than a hobby!   Looks like a great start!.
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Thanks Bill.  I'm looking forward to this year's grow.  I'm going to try and keep the process simple, but I also know that I tend to geek out, so I'm sure I'll find something in the process to play around with :)
 
Peter S said:
I really like your germinating setup.
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Thanks!  There is a "specialty gardening" store close to my house that has an amazing variety of stuff for growing.  They make no bones about it that their primary customers are pot growers and they think its kind'a cute that I get all this stuff for peppers.  I really liked this germination tray because the lid is tall enough the plants can stay in there a while without hitting the top, and it has two vents on it so I can open them up to keep the humidity under control.  We keep the house pretty cool during the winter to save money, so the lid should also help keep in the heat from the heat mat.    
 
I have a feeling I'll have to aim a small fan down at the vents to provide air circulation once all the seeds have sprouted to make sure its not too humid and I don't develop white fungus.  I've been burned by that before.
 
Hah, I went to Home Depot a week or two ago and the guy there refused to sell me any seed starting supplies. :rolleyes: So I ordered peat pellets online and made do with tupperware and perlite. Wish I had a shop like yours near by.
 
It's been my experience that the "leave them alone" method is the best as well, as long as you provide a good foundation and don't, say, forget you've put your last Bhut Jolokia in a pot on your front porch for several weeks in August!
 
Got my first couple hooks today.  Woohoo!!!
 
My 4 x 4' grow light bit the dust a couple days ago.  So I've got my 3 x 2' backup light shining on the hooks, and a new 6 x 4' light fixture on order which should show up on Wed.  50 cells planted with two seeds per cell.  My goal is to get 18 plants into the ground.  Its a regular pepper Thunder Dome in here.  Only the best survive!
 
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Updates! I'm intrigued by your KISS method, a lot of literature here on different techniques but this one is most appealing to me. I'm trying everything in my power to not baby my babies to death. Its my first year growing from seed, so I don't wanna fug it up
 
Everybody is growing right along pretty well.  Most of my seeds germinated.  I haven't done the official count, but I'm thinking close to ~90%.  I let them get too dry one day and lost 2 little guys, but that's why I planted 100 seeds when I only need 18 plants.
 
KISS Lessons
 
Peat Pellets: I like the simplicity of these things.  Cut my setup effort by about 80%. 
 
Watering with Peat Pellets: be careful, these things dry out FAST!  Last year I would bottom water by soaking the seedling tray for 20 minutes then putting them back into a dry outer tray.  No need for letting plants sit in standing water longer than necessary.  But with these peat pellets, a 20 minute soak would leave them dry by the next morning.  So I'm pouring water into the outer water tray until its about 1/2 inch up the sides of the seedling tray.  That seems to give them enough water to last about 3 days.
 
Heat: We keep our house pretty cool in the winter so I have a germination heat mat going on the time to keep the ambient temps up.  To keep it from heating up the soil too much and damaging the roots, I have a thick towel on top of the heat mat, and the outer tray the seedling tray sits in has 1/2 inch ridges in it, so the peat pellets are not sitting directly against the heat map.
 
Humidity reader and dome: I was really excited about the whole humidity reader on the germination dome.  I'm a data geek and really wanted to use it to help fine tune the humidity level and keep the dome on as long as possible.  Turns out it was just way too humid in there, even with the vents open and a fay blowing on the vents.  I ended up with a little bit of damping off fungus.  You can see it on the outer cells on the pic below.  I ended up taking the dome off after about 3 days.  I should have kept it simple and just skipped the dome!  :doh:
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Time to trim out the weaker ones.  Sorry guys...
 
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I transplanted 40 out of the original 50 plants today.  I'm always nervous during transplant day.  I'm afraid I'm gonna do something wrong and everybody is gonna die.  
 
This year all plants are going into 4 inch pots, then later into half gallon pots before finally going into raised beds.  For the 4 inch pots I used 4 parts Happy Frog Potting Soil mixed with 1 part fine bark.  Then topped with a 1/4 inch layer of fine bark so the soil isn't exposed.
 
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I really love these three purple Cheiro Roxa peppers.  I can't wait to see what they look like full grown.
 
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KISS Lessons Continued:
 
Peat Pods: (thumbs down) while these really simplified planting process, in the end I think I would have had better results with some kind of loose planting matter.  I used a moisture meter to monitor moister levels in the peat pods, and after watering they seemed to get ultra saturated and stay that way for about 2 days, then dry out completely in a matter of hours.  Not that great for peppers (or so I've read).  I think next year I'm going to go with Happy Frog Potting Soil for planting. 
 
Germination Dome: (thumbs down) just to reiterate, I should have just skipped the dome...or maybe just used it for only 1-2 days.  I ended up getting a thin layer of white fungus on around half of the peat pods.  It didn't seem to affect the seedling's health, but when transplanting I had to scrape about 2-3 mm of peat off the top of each pod to get it off.  Hopefully this won't hurt the plants in the long run.
 
turbo said:
KISS Lessons Continued:
 
Peat Pods: (thumbs down) while these really simplified planting process, in the end I think I would have had better results with some kind of loose planting matter.  I used a moisture meter to monitor moister levels in the peat pods, and after watering they seemed to get ultra saturated and stay that way for about 2 days, then dry out completely in a matter of hours.  Not that great for peppers (or so I've read).  I think next year I'm going to go with Happy Frog Potting Soil for planting. 
 
Germination Dome: (thumbs down) just to reiterate, I should have just skipped the dome...or maybe just used it for only 1-2 days.  I ended up getting a thin layer of white fungus on around half of the peat pods.  It didn't seem to affect the seedling's health, but when transplanting I had to scrape about 2-3 mm of peat off the top of each pod to get it off.  Hopefully this won't hurt the plants in the long run.
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Turbo,
Boy do I agree with this one regarding the peat pots.  They do seem to get to wet and stay that way to long and with the humidity domes, mine then get a green mold/slime on the top surface.  But the ones that get past that point seem to do fine, just that I had a higher percentage of ones that dies off due to being to moist.  Back to the starter soil next year.  Just my personal results this year.
 
I look forward to seeing how your Cheiro Roxa peppers do this year.
 
bpwilly said:
Turbo,
Boy do I agree with this one regarding the peat pots.  They do seem to get to wet and stay that way to long and with the humidity domes, mine then get a green mold/slime on the top surface.  But the ones that get past that point seem to do fine, just that I had a higher percentage of ones that dies off due to being to moist.  Back to the starter soil next year.  Just my personal results this year.
 
I look forward to seeing how your Cheiro Roxa peppers do this year.
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Thanks Bill.  I'm pretty excited about the Cheiro Roxa.  They look to be some of my healthiest plants so far.  My fatalii look sad again this year, both yellow and white.  Its my favorite pepper and I have the WORST luck with them.  Hopefully I'll nurse them back to health.
 
How are your plants coming along?
 
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