• Do you need help identifying a 🌶?
    Is your plant suffering from an unknown issue? 🤧
    Then ask in Identification and Diagnosis.

overwintering Winter-Summer in OZ "Comparison" / Aussie Blabberers

Who will win?

  • A muppet

    Votes: 20 34.5%
  • A muppet

    Votes: 15 25.9%
  • A muppet

    Votes: 23 39.7%

  • Total voters
    58
Interesting, seems we have it on our doorstep in Nimbin, no wonder the weed grows so well there. LoL

The only commercially significant Australian deposits are near Chillagoe, in the Tertiary volcanic province of southeastern Queensland, and northeastern New South Wales. Production is currently restricted to Queensland. In New South Wales, many occurrences of perlite occur near Nimbin, in mostly rhyolitic sequences associated with the Mount Warning Central Complex

Read here.

Mezo.
 
Lets say if i was going to grow tens of thousands of plants in pots,,, :whistle:

I have use of a giant growing machine, it was built to grow food for his cows (500 ton a day) it cost a shit load of money to build this thing & now its sitting idle since the drought has passed, you can grow anything inside it & i thought hmm chilli plants.

It has grow lights, humidity & temperature control & it can even dehydrate stuff if you want it to, its growing under lights under a massive scale & ive got use of it if i wanted.

Mezo.

Are you trying to say "pot plants" there, meez? Hmmm..... :D

And you know the rules.... pics or it doesn't exist!
 
Are you trying to say "pot plants" there, meez? Hmmm..... :D

And you know the rules.... pics or it doesn't exist!

Nah he already said no growing any weed. LoL

I have the opportunity to use this expensive bit of kit to grown anything i like in (except ganja) and thought i could grow chilli seedlings in there for wholesale supply to garden centers, he has hundreds of acres sitting up halfway up a mountain (frost free) you like eh? you like? i could grow thousands of plants up there.

He has seen my chilli`s growing away & i gave him some Bhut powder to try (nearly blew his head off as he used whey to much) then he rang me with a suggestion of using his giant growing machine he has sitting there idle.

So im doing a bit of detective work to see where you can buy everything in "BULK" potting mix, pots, seeds etc.

Mezo.
 
  • Like
Reactions: nee
I like! I like! :cool:

What garden centers are you looking to snag?

Well, Trips, you'll be proud of me, mate... followed your advice and dug a whole pile of lucerne in to my patch today, mulched with the stuff too, and now to just let it sit for a month, aye?
 
Stuff that... do it while you're drunk! :D

I can just see it....

I wansht ya ta shell ma planshhht ya bashtards.... :drunk:

:rofl:

Sorry, Wildfire, thought I would move the fruit fly talk over here and stop hijacking ol' Meez's thread.... ;)

Yeah, I was thinking companion planting as well but have since heard it is ineffective against the bastages. I will still go ahead and do it but not expecting much--if anything at all--in terms of fruit fly deterrent. Mainly looking at the other advantages of it now.

The more I read into the bastages, the more it seems like they have come straight outta hell! Sounds like even the most effective means of control of 'em is still only semi-effective at best. :(
 
Fruit flies? No companion or any other type of planting will help.

Dunno, run after them everyday with fly spray? - I've done this BTW.

Baits (I tried the sweet malt/protein baits with spinosa -which is a bacteria that stuffs them up).
Never let an infected fruit/pod hit the ground - identify infected fruit, plastic bag them and bin them before the maggots get active, the fruit rots and they get their ticket to the ground.
nematodes - some good ones eat the larvae in the soil. Most nematodes are bad, especially my root knot ones, but reading up on the life cycle of the fruit fly, the bastards can live a long time in the soil, so need something going on there in the soil IMHO.
 
That wicking thing is very interesting mega. Makes sense.
I always thought as vermiculite's job as being to hold moisture. The stuff here is expensive and probably too fine though anyway. I used coir to do the job I thought vermiculite did as it was a budget option, ie hold moisture and nutes. But coir and vermiculite really don't do the same thing.

You're right about perlite too, you need heaps, a bit of perlite randomly scattered doesn't really do a lot, even I know you need heaps and heaps of it now, and I'm wondering how economical that's going to be seeing as while it's cheap on ebay, it's not cheap to be delivered to Perth.
But that wicking thing makes me even more interested in using greeny reusable shopping bags, I wonder how well they'd help. Got to look at them more is see how well they breathe, absorb, wick and evaporate, and look at various other container and potting mix options available here. Not going to do anything on a big scale, just learn and experiment so I know more what to do after I move. Maybe I could take some plants with me, I hope so but not guaranteed which is why i'm not going to do more than one or two experiments in the meantime..
Hey Pablo, I just brought 100ltrs of vermiculite for $43 and 100ltrs of perlite for $41 from isobellas hydro nursery in wannaroo. If you want to get it even cheaper there is a perlite/vermiculite factory in Jandakot which sell the 100ltr bags for $28+GST.

050281c8.jpg
$85 Bargin!!!

9fc97c89.jpg
Got me Vermihut yesdee!
3fdcb87d.jpg
Can't wait to harvest sum gold!!

6b6fa31e.jpg
Also scored this bad boy. Turns out its cheaper to by one than to make one..?
 
Wow, thanks for the heads up, that's awesome prices!

Damn winter, things starting to go wrong here.
One overwintered plant full of the biggest aphids I have ever seen!
Still dealing with some cases of fungus and BLS
Couple of plants I cut back months ago growing back, but really really light green leaves and ferts doesn't seem to fix it (not over watered as they have been out of the rain and only watered every 2-3 weeks). Other plants I have not cut back are still normal darker green leaves.

I also have to face facts that my favourite plants that got some probelms last year (fungus, BLS and everything), some aren't going to make it. The hardest hit were of course my TS BT, Fatalii, 7 pot red, 7 pot yellow, bonda ma jacques, marouga red and scotch bonnet red. I planted them all in the ground for the winter. Good recovery from the 7 pot red and yellow, the TS BT doesn;t look dead, the fatalii does though, and the marouga red, brain strain and scotch bonnet are touch and go. I'm just going to leave them alone and worry about new seedlings for those varieties I think :(

Lost 5 seedlings this morning, eaten by slugs or snails (and I hunted and killed about 12 yesterday). So I don't know where the slugs came from, seems like revenge from them, as my plants weren't touched until I starting killing them. I only went on a rampage turning over ever likely hiding spot because there was a nibble on a broccoli plant, that plant is fine, just a nibble. So I hunted and killed them so for revenge that completely ate 5 seedlings.

About 5 more seedlings I tossed as they were under performing and I didn't need them as I had others. BTW the slugs went for the baby seedlings which I only had one off, like my only spare brainstrain, my only choc scorp I was growing spare got more mature seedlings that I started before winter for myself, these babies I was just growing as the one extra to give away to whoever I knew wanted it.

Also 1 jalapeno seedling onto it's 3 true leaves flopped over dead (damping off, rotted way underneath the soil line). Seems to happen a lot with jalapenos for me and only when they get bigger, pretty rare otherwise.

Through out a few seeds that were rotting in the soil, I think with that and the damping off case my potting mix has gone bad, going to keep them in coir longer and the next time I decide to germinate (and get fresh coir at that).


edit: Oh, and the good news: Some of my over wintered plants never stopped podding because I didn't touch them. I should have cut them back a bit because they either made a couple of full size pods, or heaps and heaps of tiny pods, ie next to useless.
The ones I trimmed a fair bit off due to fungus or other issues seem to be bouncing back the best, never lost new leaves, now showing flower buds - I should have done this to all of them.
The ones I cut back severely are growing nicely again (except for the light green leaved plant) but all them them will take a couple of months I think. So I cut them back too much and too late. Some I cut back severely even before winter and they have some full size pods already.
 
Is it just me pablo or is the winter cold and wet hanging on a bit long this year? I dunno maybe its because I'm in a new house this year but I keep expecting the warmer weather to kick in.


Finally got my cheap china pH meter in the mail after 30+ days delivery time! Turns out my hydro reservoir was at 7.6 but the test plants are still growing well. Brought it down a bit. :P The roots are filling out their pots and cells and are almost ready to go outside.

boysandplants003.jpg


There are 87 good Jalapenos and 30 bhut jolokias to test in a few different soil mixes. Might travel the 2 minute journey to Jandakot to get some vermiculite. Thanks Lavatung for that info ;)

Have to decide what soil mixes to trial. Hopefully going to end up with more than 130 mature plants in 9 litre buckets so going to need a large amount of medium and need it cheap. Looking at different combinations of cheap potting mix, coco coir, perlite, vermiculite, dynamic lifter. Maybe pinebark mulch mixed in to bulk it out??

edit Will observe how well these plants grow in different mixes and use that as my main mix.
 
Everyones plants/grows are looking and sounding like they are shaping up nicely for spring. Hope yours come through OK Pablo. Gas I hope it goes well for you bro. Let me know how you find it later in the season
 
Things not going so well on this end. Still trying to figure out what is causing my babies to yellow. Will probably prematurely pot up the worst affected ones into some new potting mix this weekend which I reckon will make a world of difference (it's definitely something to do with the current mix). On top of that, friggin' broad mite is causing me piles of grief already. Went ahead and ordered Californicus predator mites the other day but recieve and email today telling me there are delays due to high demand ATM. Bummer.... I need them now.... like literally NOW!

Oh yeah, germ is still up the shithouse no matter what I do... soak in chamomile, soak in h2o2, soak for 24 hours, soak for 12 hours, soak for a couple hours, don't soak at all, pay careful attention to the temps inside the germ box and jiffys, make sure the jiffys are staying moist but not wet.... yada yada yada. I'm starting to think it's just these cheap ebay jiffys. Used to pump shit with the old Fothergill ones. King of germ. Since I stopped using 'em, nothing but troubles.

OK, I think I'm done now.... :lol:

How is your season shaping up, Trips?
 
Shite gas .... your season is sounding a little rough so far... I am sure it will get better soon. (Fingers crossed for you).
Yeah my season is slowly taking shape potted up 18 seedlings last Sunday into there starting pots and they are all outside fulltime now (albeit on a nice sheltered sunny balcony) and still have a further 10 still inside being fed some extra artificial light at night to pot up. That are a little younger.
I am going to bonsai most of my over winters and have been cutting them back over the winter slowly until they are reduced to a nice stout stem.
Will be looking at using 15 litre pots this season to see if that helps production and plant health (up from 9 litres last season)
Will be updating my log in the coming weeks ...
 
Thanks, mate. As long as I can get the bloody broad mite outta the way SOON, things might turn around yet with some new potting mix.

Glad to hear things are taking shape over there! :dance:

Which ones are the 9L and 15L pots? Measured my 25cm and 30cm pots a while back but can't remember the volume of 'em now!
 
Is it just me pablo or is the winter cold and wet hanging on a bit long this year?
Nah, normal. I started this time last year and did badly as I had no decent lights, then sept was cold and very wet, lost most plants and had to start again. So it's going to stay cold and sunny, or get very wet for another month at least.
Your plants look very good though, younger than mine and bigger. but again I'm not using much heat or light, electricity costs a lot and I'd rather use the money for booze :D

Everyones plants/grows are looking and sounding like they are shaping up nicely for spring. Hope yours come through OK Pablo. Gas I hope it goes well for you bro. Let me know how you find it later in the season
Thanks trippa.
Some older plants doing OK, some even starting to pod decent pods now (the ones I cut back in April). In fact some wouldn't stop over the winter with lots of tiny pods (the one's I didn't cut back at all).
 
I've had a lot of trouble in the last week or so, as the temps warmed up in the day my little fishtank project has been getting to much heat during the middle of the day so all the plants have been looking like they were going to die. I was thinking it was due to the cold nights but i've put it more down to the warmer days hitting the glass intensifying the heat which is good because I've controlled that by blocking some of the sun out and turning the heater/thermostat of completely during the day, I suppose thats what you get in a small environment larger temp fluctuations and close monitoring when things don't look great, GOD dammit I neEd a WeEding TenT....

P.s Gas stay away from my place... :P
 
Anyone tried one of these heat mats?
http://www.quicksales.com.au/ad/28w-heat-mat-with-thermostat/3581023

Looks alright, 28w instead of 9-14W, built in t/stat. $50

I've done germination in autumn without heat, and a couple in june with my small heater, and keep plenty alive over winter fine.
But if I move down south I'll probably have to germinate in july in one batch, like a 48cell prop tray under lights or something/
 
Just got the word... Californicus are on their way! :dance:

Had to give ButchT and NOT Dorset a haircut yesterday as they were both being smashed by mite and I had to do something to slow the bastages down. Probably wouldn't have gone so hard had I known the delay in Californicus was only going to be a very short one, but what can you do? Had to do something! Figured while I was at it, why not dig up another bed around them?

IMG_7827.jpg


Tried to avoid the immediate root-zone around both plants so hopefully haven't done any serious damage to either while digging in compost and poo.

Finished the other bed last week:

IMG_7830.jpg


What a trooper... still keen to serve:

IMG_7834.jpg


Found a little volunteer growing the other week.... no idea what he is but I'm gonna keep 'im: :D

IMG_7831.jpg


Black baccatum?

IMG_7839.jpg


(Probably guessed.... sun tan)
 
Well, here goes...

IMG_7852.JPG


First release.

Released on all my chillies, "broad mite hotspots" around the yard and bits and pieces of the perimeter.
 
  • Like
Reactions: nee
Back
Top