Growing peppers at high latitudes
16 years ago hydroponics, indoor growbox, peppers
Here in the Seattle area we are, as you say, latitudelly challenged. We are fortunately to have the Pacific Ocean to give us mild winters and summers though our distance from the equator provides our plants with less intense light and a relatively short growing season for summer crops. One in particular difficult summer crop are peppers.
This is important because one of the major exports of my garden are the ingredients to allow me to make homemade garden salsa (tomatoes, garlic, onions, cilantro, jalapeño peppers) Al ingredients come from my garden (except for jalapeño peppers) This year I am determined to fix this.
I have a couple strategies for doing this, the first is to “start early” pepper plants require 80-110 days from seedling to harvest, timing is everything. Given our late winters here over the past couple years, I don’t really have much of a cushion here and would also be nice if the peppers were ripe when the tomatoes are getting red as well. To get a head start many weeks ago I planted several jalapeño pepper seeds and they currently are turning into some great looking pepper plants in my grow box. As they have grown I have potted them up to encourage them to continue to grow vigorously.
Not wanting to put my eggs peppers in one basket, I have decided to try a few different techniques in case one completely fails I hopefully have a couple backups:
- Grow pepper plant in grow box in WonderSoil
- Grow pepper plant hydroponically using a Grodan Gro-Blocks
- Grow pepper plant in the ground beside my tomatoes
- Grow pepper plant in large pot in sunniest location
I honestly can not really predict the outcome of this experiment. The grow box as the advantage of accurate temperature control but the CFLs though work great can’t compare to full sun. On the other hand outdoors has the great light intensity of the actual sun though given the pepper plants can stop growing lacking 60 degree nights and at least 70 degrees during day. Given we don’t have too many nights greater than 60 degrees the grow box might have a chance.
UPDATE — 05/25/2009
Plant grown in WonderSoil in grow box at temperature controlled to remain above 60 degrees at night and a high of 80 during the day. This is amazing results compared to the 2.5 inch plants I started with less than a month ago.
Plant grown hydroponically using a Grodan Gro-Blocks also in temperature controlled grow box.
Plant grow in actual dirt outside in good light
Plant grown in pot outside…well this one is already out after some high winds and cold mornings this one was looking pretty bad to I brought to the infirmary (the grow box) to bring it back to life, which seems to have done wonders.
The obvious winner at this point is the pepper plant in WonderSoil in the grow box, though I have noticed some recent growth in the outdoor plant now the weather has started warming up, so might be some time for Mother Nature to redeem itself. Overall I have been very impressed with the results of the grow box but still need to see if I can get flowers and fruit…until the next update…
UPDATE — 06/20/2009
We were blessed with some warm weather so the outdoor potted plant has been doing great blossoming and almost a dozen of good sized peppers growing.
I have seen plenty of blossoms on the pepper plants in the grow box though I have not have and fruit set. I have two theories what is causing this, first is we have hat some hot weather with the garage getting over 85 degrees even with best exhaust and airflow it was hard to keep the temperature from exceeding 90 degrees which causes the blossoms to drop. The second reason is I have been attempting to hand pollinate the flowers with the absence of some nice bees to do the work for me. I have been using a fine paintbrush without much luck. Switching to having better airflow and using a Q-Tip to simulate a bees bottom.
The plant I had in the ground eventually got overtaken by a pumpkin plant which I removed and moved to the grow box given it had not shown any significant signs of growth since I transplanted it there.
Right now seems the best method is grow the pepper plant to about 18 inches and just let mother nature take care of things at that point.
Tags: cheap, cilantro, garden seeds, garlic bulbs, growbox, led, outdoor plants, pepper plants, salsa garden, tomato plants, vegetables
Growing in dirt outside
16.1 years ago cilantro, cucumbers, garlic bulbs, indoor growbox, onions, outdoor seed starting, peas, tomato
I haven’t done many posts in a while about regular old gardening in actual dirt so figured a good time to do an update. Though I enjoy indoor seed starting in my LED grow box and computerized grow box, some plants need to be started outdoors. Today my daughters and I planted the last these plants for fall outdoor planting.
A few weeks ago, we planted garlic, onions, spinach, and peas which are doing well. I love growing these plants no matter how late your spring comes these plants are hardy they are pretty hard to kill off.
Today we planted carrots, lettuce, and cilantro leaving a little space left to do some successive cilantro planting in a couple weeks to ensure I have enough for salsa by the time the tomatoes are ready this summer.
Speaking of tomatoes, they along with jalapeño peppers, and cucumbers (actually flowering) are doing great in the computerized grow box. In the LED grow box I have pumpkin, Black Eyed Susan, small sunflowers, and Purple Coneflowers using Grodan Gro-Blocks.
Nice to finally see some stuff in the ground though still hoping the weather gets better before my cucumbers try to escape the grow box.
Tags: cheap, cilantro, garden seeds, garlic bulbs, growbox, led, outdoor plants, pepper plants, salsa garden, tomato plants, vegetables
How to collect and save onion seeds from your garden
16.3 years ago onions, seed saving, seed storing
Last year I collected cilantro seeds and they were a great success in my garden that this past Spring I made a commitment to myself that I would try to collect more seeds this season. Though I wanted to get more I was able to collect seeds from my onions, jalapenos, and cilantro. The jalapeno seeds were pretty easy I set some seeds aside on a paper towel while making some salsa. After they appeared to be dry I threw them in a brown paper lunch bag.
For the onions once the florets (flower balls you see above) got real ugly and dry and I could see the black seeds emerging I placed them in a paper bag before the birds got to them. I then put the bag on top of our kitchen cabinets and forgot about them for couple months. Today I pulled the bag down and confirmed they definitely were dry. To separate the seeds from the pods I broke apart (which happens easily) and placed the contents into a metal strainer. I gently broken open any remaining pods and agitate the strainer. This causes the small black seeds to move to the bottom, allowing the pods to float to the top and forcing many of the stems to fall through.
I then skimmed off as many of the stems/pods as possible leaving and putting the seeds into a brown paper bag until I can get into town to buy some more manageably sized brown envelopes (recovering from Seattle snowstorm)
After a few minutes of work I now have hundreds of onions seeds which I probably only have use for couple dozen. Seed exchange anyone?
Tags: birds, cheap, cilantro, garden seeds, led, salsa garden, vegetables
First tomato of the season
16.8 years ago tomato
Well it is official I have my first official red tomato of the season this morning while watering. It was from a hanging basket my dad gave to me for Father’s day called "Tom’s Tumbler" which should cascade over providing lots of cherry tomatoes.
I also noticed some of my "Early Girls" were also starting to produce so fresh garden salsa should be coming soon.
Tags: led, salsa garden, tomato plants
How to grow garlic in your garden
17.1 years ago garlic bulbs, growing challenge
My experiment of planting organic garlic which I bought from my local produce section of my grocery store seems to be working well. If you want to try this yourself here are some hopefully easy to follow steps:
- Buy some good looking garlic at your grocery store (I chose organic since I made an assumption there was a decreased chance that it was treated to prevent growth)
- When you are ready to plant, carefully break open the garlic and separate the tear shaped cloves.
- Take the largest cloves and plant in well cultivated soil 2 inches deep and 4 inches apart with pointed end up, these will be for your full garlic bulbs.
- Take the smaller cloves and either use in some spaghetti sauce or plant them in your garden 1-2 inches apart to harvest as baby garlic (think green onions, but strong garlic flavor)
- Fertilize with a balanced fertilizer (or bone meal) during planting but avoid fertilizing after that point since you don’t want to encourage too much foliage growth by having an abundance of nitrogen in the soil and allow the plant to use its energy to grow a big bulb.
- When the foliage on the “scapes” began to completely uncurl you can cut them off and use them on salads, scrambled eggs, or even garlic scape pesto. I would recommend leaving a couple of your garlic plants with scape attached since it also works a natural indicator of when your garlic is ready to harvest. When the lower third of the scape is light brown (the color your expect for garlic) it is ready to dig out.
- Take any cracked bulbs and use them immediately, take the remaining bulbs and wash off any dirt and let them dry for 2-3 weeks depending on how dry your climate is.
- Once cured hang in a mesh bag or braid the garlic and given proper airflow and temperature (50-70 degrees) your garlic should last for 6 months (if not eaten by then)
As you can see growing garlic is pretty low maintenance and I am definitely looking forward to using it to my salsa this fall.
Tags: cheap, garden seeds, garlic bulbs, led, organic vegetables, outdoor plants, salsa garden, vegetables
