The Cheap Vegetable Gardener

Growing Challenge: Planting the seeds

Feb 19, 2008 growing challenge, seed storing 6 Comments

I have decided to participate in The Growing Challenge hosted by the people at Elements in Time. The short version is to try growing at least one thing from seed that you have not tried before.

My daughters and I have decided to grow some tomatoes (Sweetie, San Marzano, Siletz) which I normally pick from the limited choice of seedlings that are available at my garden store. While picking seeds my 3 year old insisted on getting corn, don’t think we have the space for it to be productive, guess in the end we might have some nice Halloween decorations. We also noticed that some of our potatoes had started to sprout so we have decided to add them to our list.

Stay tuned for updates on our growing challenge.

Harvesting seeds from Bhut Jolokia peppers

Nov 21, 2009 Bhut Jolokia, ghost pepper, harvest, seed saving 4 Comments

I was lucky enough to win some Bhut Jolokia pepper seeds from Red Icculus.  In case you haven’t heard of these they are the hottest peppers on earth having a heat rating of over 1 million scoville units.  Just to put that into comparison jalapenos are around 5000 scoville units.  One property of this pepper is the way the heat builds after consumption, on first bite it is spicy but takes a few seconds until you really feel the burn which is where it gets the name “ghost pepper.”

Now when dealing with these peppers I recommend using extreme caution I have some pain in my nose hours later just from breathing around these things so vinyl gloves and possibly even a mask would be recommended.

Once you have the safety precautions in place the process is actually very simple.  Just break them up and pick the seeds up and store in a homemade seed packet.  Now eating the pepper whole is not a challenge I want to take though saving the dried pepper flakes and adding a pinch so some chili might be up my alley.  Though if you want to watch some people in pain taking see these videos of people taking the Bhut Jolokia pepper challenge on YouTube.  Here is my favorite and my inspiration to not take the challenge.

I am planning on trying to grow one of these using my new hydroponic setup, well at least once I get around to building…so stay tuned.

Growing Pepper Plants Indoors

Jun 6, 2010 Bhut Jolokia, indoor growbox, jalapeno, peppers 4 Comments

Pepper plants need specific environmental (temperature and humidity) conditions to establish growth and create high yields.  If the temperatures get too low it will stunt its growth or not produce blossoms, when the temperatures get too high the plant will drop it blossoms resulting in no or reduce yields.

Read More …

pH needs of plants in soil or hydroponics

Jan 6, 2010 hydroponics, pH, water 6 Comments

With the exception of some of my acid loving plants and flowers I normally do not have to worry much about the pH of my soil.  This is because I have amended my gardens with nutrient rich soils in raised beds over my alkaline clay I get naturally in my area.  This and the fact that due to natural and manmade causes the rainfall is slightly acidic and given the average range for the sweet spot of most edible vegetables (see table below) is 5.8 to 6.0 having your soil slightly acidic this is perfect.

Now when it comes to hydroponics this is entirely different.  My tap water has a pH of around 7.5 and the fluctuation of plant using nutrients and transpiration can cause great havoc on the pH on your hydroponic system.  Now this creates a challenge but also an opportunity to have control with great precision your pH and keep your plants growing in the sweet spot for the healthiest plants and the greatest yields.

So whether you are growing hydroponically, or simply trying to figure out why your Fennel didn’t do so well last year take a look at the table below, hopefully for some hints of what happened.

Recommended pH Ranges of Vegetables/Herbs

Heating row tunnels and grow box with Christmas lights

Dec 8, 2009 cheap, indoor growbox 9 Comments

Currently it is 16 degrees outside and given my grow box containing jalapeno peppers is in my unheated detached garage, which can bring some challenges.  Like most plants, peppers will continue to grow in the range of 60 to 90 degrees, but thrive in 70 to 90 degrees.  With the lights on the grow box gets to about 60 degrees but drips to the 50’s at night.  This will result in plants having stunted growth and begin dropping blossoms before they can start bearing fruit.

My solution, a string of green mini Christmas lights.  Just to clarify these are your typical small bulb Christmas lights not LEDs, given the efficiency of LEDs they do not product much extra heat which is what I am going for here. I also chose green Christmas lights because plants do not absorb this wavelength very well so they can be left on at night to keep heating while still letting the plants “sleep”. 

Of course results will vary depending on the size of your grow box or outside row tunnel, insulation, and exterior temperature, but I am seeing 8-10 degree increase in temperature with a single string (50 bulbs)

I am always open to new ideas to safely, cheaply and efficiently heat my grow box or row tunnel so if anyone has any other suggestions please add a comment.

Saving jalapeno seeds

Sep 7, 2009 jalapeno, peppers, seed saving 8 Comments

I am attempting to grow the best pepper plants I can indoors (grow box) so I started with jalapeno peppers.  They grow relatively small 2-3 feet and require 2-3 gallon container for growing.  While this is fine for an outdoor garden, though indoors I can only sacrifice 1 gallon container.  This summer I grew several jalapeno plants which spent half of their life in the grow box and spent our warm summer outdoors.  All of the plants produced but there was definitely a clear winner which had incredible early yields even with its small growing quarters.

I used several immature peppers (green) for salsa this year but allowed several peppers to mature (red) which I will be saving the seeds for planting this winter and next summer for future plants.  By hand selecting the best parent plants should be good old natural selection at work.

The process to collect pepper seeds is pretty simple though I must first provide this warning:

WARNING: Peppers are hot, especially the veins.  When handling peppers use caution and wash your hands well with dish soap.  Under no conditions do not rub your eyes or pick rub your nose before washing your hands or you will be regretting it for a couple hours.  Using gloves is also recommended.

That being said slice the peppers lengthwise with a sharp knife.

Use a fork or spoon to gently dislodge the seeds into a small bowl.

If you are lucky enough to have hot sunny weather still (week of rain here) lay they out in the sun for a couple days and store them in a cool dry place until you are ready to plant them.  If you are sun challenged like me set them on a windowsill for a few days.

As I have said before saving you own seeds is very easy and free and as an added bonus you can personally pick the best plant to be the donors of seeds for your future plantings.  In my case I also have the benefit of a plants that is genetically grown to following my sporadic watering and care patterns.