Photo Update: Jalapenos

Look at these delicious specimens! This photo was taken when the plants were still a bit stressed from pH problems (which are now corrected). The fruits are all very healthy!

Photo Update: Pepperoncinis

I am having some problems with layout using this iPhone app for blog updates, but at least I can update from bed and you guys get to see pictures.

Here's a pepperoncini with my thumb in the photo for reference. There are about 50 (!) pepperoncinis between the two plants. They look outstanding!

Photo Update: Ancho Mangnifico

Here's a photo of the Ancho Chilis coming along nicely! These two are about four inches long.

Also, this is the first time I have tried making a post from my my iPhone. Hopefully nothing is different (worse).

Back on the farm!

My surgery went well! I'm off my feet for a few more days but once they heal, I'll be getting around better than ever!

A lot happened while I was away. Firstly, my wife took great care of the farm and learned a lot about how to keep it operating. Because of her, all of our plants are doing terrific.

I will get photos soon but for now I'll do a text update:

-The pepperoncini plants have about fifty peppers on them. The most mature peppers are nearly seven inches long! We're going to continue to let them grow until they start to turn a bit orange, then we're going to taste-test again.

-There are no baby bell peppers! Apparently I mislabeled my plants because two plants (which I thought were baby bell peppers and long thin Cayenne) both appear to be Jalapenos. I'm not upset- the fruits of both plants are plump and shiny, extremely healthy and delicious-looking.

-The Ancho Magnifico is named appropriately! This one has about twenty fruits. The largest is about 4.5 inches long and two inches in diameter. Like the jalapenos, these have an extraordinary dark green color and are very smooth, blemish-free and healthy looking!

-There was a lot of blossom drop while I was away. For a couple of days the water levels dropped quite low and the pH got a little low. I'm not too worried about this because all of the plants still have plenty of healthy flowers and no shortage of fruit. The adverse conditions have been corrected.

-Each bucket drinks about 2 quarts of water today. Very vigorous fruiting is taking place!

-I have no control group, but based on the accelerated and vigorous fruiting, I am happy with the performance of the Kool Blooms bloom enhancer.

-Of the seedlings that I planted before I went to the hospital, I have one very health specimen each of Butternut Squash and Babylon Cucumber. Today we're going to prepare a bucket for the Butternut Squash.

-The Baby Bell Pepper seedling was almost dead when I returned home, but I prepared a tonic of Maxi-Grow, Trinity (Roots Organics) and Hygrozyme (A new enzyme product that I will discuss in a future update). Literally overnight, that pepper seedling straightened up and pushed out its first set of true leaves so I'm going to say that plant is saved.

-As I get more experience keeping this blog, I'm adding lots more categories to the posts so that I'll end up with a nice searchable database for myself and for you.

Away from the Bucket Farm

I will be in the hospital for the next several days for surgery. You see, I have saddle bone deformities on both of my feet and I've finally gotten tired of wearing these special big puffy shoes that only come in one color. Obviously, I'll be off my feet for several days. People say you should do this surgery one foot at a time but I don't want to fill out the insurance paperwork twice.

My wife is going to take care of the peppers in the Bucket Farm and I'll be back with regular updates starting next week.

Changed reservoirs

This morning I refreshed both pepper reservoirs, using this formulation:

-4 gallons tap water (left to sit overnight to dissipate chlorine and chloramines)
-4 teaspoons Maxi-Bloom dry nutrient powder (less 1 teaspoon from my usual recipe)
-1 teaspoon Kool Bloom dry bloom enhancer (this is half the strength suggested on the package)

I have read some reports of gardners burning their plants with these high-powered bloom enhancers so I decided to try to introduce Kool Bloom gently. I used one teaspoon less of my basic bloom nutrient and half the suggested dose of Kool Bloom.

Last night I read an awesome article in Urban Garden magazine that discussed the differences between hydroponic and soil-grow food crops. There was an interesting bit about the aroma and flavor of hydroponically grown foods. I believe the gist of the statement was that mineral salt nutrients will develop healthy plants with larger fruit yields, but additional organic supplements are required for plants to develop full-flavored produce.

So, with this in mind I decided to add some additional products to my reservoirs:

-1 Tablespoon Roots Organics 'Trinity' (for Humic acid)
-1 Tablespoon Technaflora 'B.Seaweed' (vitamins & enhanced nutrient uptake)

In total, the solution had this profile:

-pH 4.83
-PPM 1283 (spot on!)

Two teaspoons of pH UP brought me to a perfect pH of 5.8 and I moved the plants into their new reservoirs!

New Crops

Sorry for the rapid-fire updates today, but I've done a lot. I started some new crops this evening. I have decided to try Rapid Rooter plugs instead of starting my seeds in pure perlite. Rapid Rooter plugs are strong, spongy plugs of bark and peat infused with some micro-nutrients. They're compatible for transfer into hydroponic systems of all sorts and supposedly contain microbes that colonize quickly in the developing plant roots. We'll see!

The new crops are:
-Butternut Squash (Lilly Miller Seeds)
-Cucumber (Babylon Cucumber) (Territorial Seed Co)
-Miniature Bell Pepper (Territorial Seed Co)

Right now there are three plugs of each type of seed germinating on a seedling mat (basically a low-grade heater) under a 42 watt compact fluorescent bulb @ 6500k (full spectrum).

All three of these plants are of a climbing, viny sort, so I have prepared the grow area by building a lattice of jute twine that covers on entire wall of the grow area. I will train the plants to climb this lattice. You'll see photos of the lattice when I move the plants into the grow area.

The whole operation

So far I have only taken closeup photos of the pepper plants that I'm growing, so I thought I'd offer a photo of the entire growing area. [TIP: You can click any of the photos in my updates to view a larger image of that photo].

So, here's the setup: It's a growing tent that is five feet wide, five feet deep and six foot-four inches tall. Overhead is a 400 watt HPS (high pressure sodium) lamp with a 24 inch reflector. It is currently burning a 2200k GE Photosynthesis bulb.

If you look between the two buckets of peppers, you see an inverted reflector with a 42watt compact fluorescent bulb at 2500k color. The purpose of this inverted bulb is to get light to parts of the plant that receive less light from the overhead lamp due to the thick canopies of the plants.

I'm currently growing about 25% of what I am capable of growing in this space with the equipment that I have currently, but I've been waiting for some evidence of success before investing in germinating any new plants. I'm fairly convinced now that things are going well, so I'll probably start germinating some new seeds this week. 

My... barrel runneth over

It rained a bit more this afternoon and when I got home I found that the FIFTY-SEVEN gallon rain barrel had filled and was actually overflowing. Wow! The water is not looking much cleaner, however.

I think I will try to clean up the roof and gutters a bit and if I can capture some decently clear water I will daisy chain a second barrel. It looks like there will be plenty of water to save this fall and winter.

For now, I'll use this water to make bleach solution to clean out buckets before re-using them. I don't feel good about using this water to grow food, but I am happy to use it to make sanitizing solution.

I'll run outside with the meter tonight or tomorrow morning and collect pH and TDS readings on the rainwater, just out of curiosity.

Captured some rainwater. . .

It rained a little bit last night so I ran to the rain barrel this morning to look at the catch. Looks like about 20 gallons, which is way more than I expected from the tiny amount of rain we got. The only problem is, the water looks like tea. It likely is a tea of sorts... water steeped in the pine needles and branches that clog our gutters.

I suppose it's also possible that this is general filth from the roof, as it's been a very dry summer and lots of pollen and debris and so forth have been sitting up there for a long time. I'll probably drain this water off and clean the gutters and see if we can't collect some cleaner water next rainy day.

Kool Blooms?

Almost every company that produces hydroponic nutrients has a blooming/ripening formula that is advertised to produce fruit with the most amazing size and concentrations of carbohydrates and essential oils. I've never used such a product but I must say the idea certainly is appealing. I don't want to go out of my way for tiny increases in crop size or quality, but I am willing to try one additional nutrient in my reservoirs, bringing me to total of three products.

Because I'm trying to operate strictly with dry nutrients and General Hydroponics does indeed offer Kool Bloom in a dry formula, I'm going to give it a try. It's an enhancement that you add to the nutrient reservoir when your plants are in the second reproductive stage, so right about now is the correct time for most of the pepper plants to start receiving this. I'll add it when I change out the reservoirs this weekend.

Photo Update (Cayenne)

Here's a close-up photo of a bit of the fruit that's on the Cayenne pepper plant. The largest pepper seen here is probably about 1 1/4 inches long. This plant is only supposed to produce about 25 fruits... if that turns out to be true I probably won't grow this variety anymore since my growing space is at a premium and more prolific varieties of pepper are out there.

Photo Update (Pepperoncini)

Ok! Finally here's an update with some photos. This is a close-up of a couple of pepperoncinis still growing. The plant has about 20 peppers so far. The two shown here are between four and five inches long (nothing in the shot for scale). The fruits are clean and colorful. They have very smooth skin that shines like they're waxed.

We actually tasted one of the peppers because we didn't know if they were ready yet. The pepper was fully-formed inside with lots of seeds, but in additional to the taste you're familiar with, there was a bitterness that suggested they're not ready quite yet. I think they need to fatten up a bit first. Maybe 7 to 10 more days.

Switching to a digital meter

Today I made the leap and bought a Hanna digital meter that measures pH, Dissolved Solids and temperature. Up until now I have been monitoring pH levels using an inexpensive color-changing chemical kit. I have not been monitoring dissolved solids at all.

After just one use I'm sure that buying the digital meter was a wise decision. Being able to precisely measure pH and TDS gives me peace of mind.

Today I filled two fresh buckets with four gallons of water, then mixed in five teaspoons (the usual dose for my peppers) of Maxi-Bloom. I let the buckets sit for two hours and then sampled them:

pH : 4.2 (A bit low- I was surprised)
TDS: 1268 (PPM - a good, hefty supply of solvent nutrients)

A pH of 4.2 is too low for peppers, which prefer to be in the 5.5 - 6.5 range. I figured now that I have a digital meter, I can measure precisely how much pH buffer solution to add in order to get the results I want.

By slowly adding pH UP and re-testing the water in the buckets, I was able to determine that 1 1/4 teaspoons of pH UP brings the solution to a pH of almost exactly 6.0, which is perfect for the peppers. So now I know that when I draw a fresh four-gallon reservoir and add five teaspoons of Maxi-Bloom, I can add 1 1/4 tsp of pH UP at the same time and end up with a perfect batch of solution for peppers.

Starting a lettuce crop

I'm setting up a second growing area indoors for cooler weather crops, mostly greens. Today I started 12 pots of Tom Thumb lettuce from seed. I'm trying a totally maintenance-free capillary method for starting the lettuce seedlings that will hopefully make them very easy to start and move into a Deep Water Culture system. I'll describe the method in greater detail if it works out.

My growing area for cool-weather crops is a homemade 4x4x4 foot cube of white foamcore with all interior surfaces covered with Reflectix mylar insulation. The box uses one 125 watt Hydrofarm compact fluorescent lighting fixture with a 6500k daylight-spectrum bulb. These lamps are not powerful enough to grow peppers, tomatoes or other crops with high light requirements, but I'm hoping they are sufficient for lettuce and spinach.

The lights will operate 11 hours on, 13 hours off. If your 'days' are too long, lettuce will bolt and go to seed instead of producing edible leaves.

Cost of nutrients

 This is something I've been wanting to do for a while- figure out how long nutrients that I have purchased will last me, and what my unit cost is. I just decided to start purchasing my nutrients in bulk. Including sales tax, a 16 pound container of Maxi-Gro costs me $95.

This means that I'm getting a unit price of about six dollars per pound. Next I need to compute how many batches of nutrient solution I am getting per pound.

Measuring by hand, I have determined that there are 20 tablespoons of Maxi-Gro powder in each pound, so the volume breaks down like this:

1 pound = 20 tablespoons = 60 teaspoons

for the entire container:

16 pounds = 320 tablespoons = 960 teaspoons

This makes the cost of each teaspoon of Maxi-Gro almost exactly 10 cents.

Peppers and tomatoes, which are heavy feeders, receive nutrient solution at a concentration of 1 1/4 teaspoons per gallon of water. I use four-gallon reservoirs, so this means that each time I change out the water in a plants' reservoir, I use five teaspoons of Maxi-Gro powder, for a cost of 50 cents.

I change reservoirs weekly, so the total cost of fertilizer is 50 cents per week per plant.

Now our breakdown of volume looks like:

16 pounds = 320 tablespoons = 960 teaspoons =  192 five-teaspoon doses @ 50 cents each

This is enough nutrient to feed one plant continuously for 3 1/2 years, or a year's supply for four plants.

I assume that the volume measurements are similar enough that the same applies for Maxi-Bloom.

R.I.P. Mr. Jalapeno

Sometime late Sunday night, Mr. Jalapeno fell over to one side and snapped clean off of its roots and died. How horrible! The few peppers that were big enough to bother with salvaging where already shrivelled when I found the dead plant :(

I need to include some method for providing better support for heavy, bushy plants since the roots don't provide the structural support they would if they were in soil. Hard way to learn that lesson :/

Nutrients

I have selected the "Maxi" line of dry nutrients from General Hydroponics as the official nutrient of The Bucket Farm. Two main factors make these products the ideal choice in my opinion:

-Value for dollar: Dry nutrients are far, far less expensive than any competing liquid nutrient formulas; even those from the same manufacturer.

-Conservation: 100% of the shipping weight of dry nutrients is nutrients. Liquid formulas are mostly water, which is heavy, expensive and inefficient to ship.

A Rain Barrel!

Today I picked up a rain barrel (rain capture barrel) from Home Depot. We have a metal roof, and a LOT of rainwater drains off of it during the fall and winter months so I figured I should probably be capturing some of it.

I bought the barrel pictured here. It's a 57 gallon model with a standard hose-adapted faucet attached, which is handy. I don't find that I use a lot of water growing my plants, but my water usage for the bucket garden is roughly double what it takes to grow the plants once I account for all of the water I use for cleaning and sanitizing equipment.

City water is very cheap, so this is more of a conservation decision than an economic one. One more upside to using rainwater is that it is chlorine-free. I haven't actually captured and used any rainwater yet, so I don't know what the pH is.

I plan on using regular old drugstore hydrogen peroxide to sanitize the rainwater before it is used for plants.

Reservoirs Changed

With mature plants, I change the reservoirs weekly, usually on Saturday or Sunday. Today I changed 2 reservoirs: The Jalapeno plant, which has its own bucket, and the bucket containing the one Cayenne plant and two Pepperoncini plants.

I use Home Depot buckets for my containers. They are food-safe polypropylene and are very inexpensive. I keep several clean, empty buckets on hand to speed up the reservoir changes.

For water, I fill each clean bucket with four gallons of fresh water from the hose and place the full buckets inside the grow area overnight. This allows a lot of the chlorine in the city water to out-gas, as well as letting the water come up to the temperature of the grow area, reducing shock to the plants.

For nutrients, I use four teaspoons of General Hydroponics Maxi-Bloom or Maxi-Grow, depending on the plants' growth phase, and that's it! (Aside from pH adjustments)