Indoor Garden 2018-2019 Revisited

[SQWIB]

January 28th, 2019

I sprayed the Jimmy Nardello pepper with my "Aphid X" (1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper - Teaspoon Dish Soap - 1qt. water)

Here is my Robotic Bee!

January 29th, 2019


I really don't get this temp swing, I can't see how it can get to 67°F when I have the temperature controller set to 72°F, anyhow I adjusted the Temperature controller to 75°F. So the low (oil heater) is set for 75°F and the high (vent fan) is set for 80°F

I have three tomato plants with flowers, time to pollinate with my robotic bee! Everything is doing pretty good except my one pot of Jimmy Nardello peppers, the plants seem to be at a standstill.

I found where the Aphids were congregating, seems they love the cilantro. I sprayed the cilantro real good then washed the entire plant under tepid water.





January 31st, 2019

Still enduring an ongoing battle with aphids, mostly on my cilantro.

Yay! I finally got the temperature to settle down a bit, I guess with the temperature being 6°F outside helps with the cooling a bit. I think when the lights kick off and the temp in the tent drops it takes a while for the Oil Heater to come up to operating temperature from a cold start.

The plants are all doing real well, except for my Bunching Onions... I think I over watered them and one pot of Jimmy Nardellos is still a bit stunted. I have a few backups that are doing real well under the led bulbs, they're about 6" tall and already have little flower buds in the center, good, bad? who knows I'm just going to let everything do its thing with as little intervention as possible.

Most of the tomato plant have flowered and are growing extremely bushy with very thick stems, I pollinate with the electric tooth brush every day or every other day.


The tomato plant that I fertilized with the Jobes doesn't seem any different than the rest of the plants, so I will fertilize the rest of the plants this weekend.

The color of these pictures are actually a lot more purple looking than they actually are. I'll have to take some photos with the lights off.

My little tree!

I love when I'm in the tent and get that tomato plant smell, it really is a tease when its 6°F outside!

I really need to stay on top of the watering, the tomato plants are drinking up tons of water.

These Black Beauty Eggplant Plants are doing well. I also have a Listada di Gandia Eggplant Plant in a pot that has my trial potting mix in that is not doing as well, not sure if its the mix or because its a different variety. All the other plants in the Trial potting mix seem to be doing just as good as the original potting mix, no worse, no better.

I may separate the two Black Beauties and abort the Listada di Gandia and replace with one of these.

February 1st - 3rd, 2019


Aphids are out of control on the Cilantro, finally decided to cut down the cilantro and toss the cuttings, I then resprayed the cilantro and will keep an eye on it.

The Aphids are still appearing on the pepper plants but not as bad, haven't seen any on the basil, tomato, eggplants, or parsley yet.

All the tomato plants are loaded with flowers and buds, but no signs of a tomato yet, plants are like small trees, the growth is pretty incredible. Fertilized everything in the tent with some Jobes.

I called it quits on the Greens table for the season, between slow growth and battling a mouse that loves lettuce I decided to clean up the area and bait it, I'll be starting my seedlings in a few weeks anyhow.

My brother stopped over so I gave him a few Abe Lincoln Tomato Plants, some basil, cilantro and split my parsley in half, I was impressed with the roots on this guy.

 

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February 4th - 5th, 2019

I wasn't real happy with the growth of the greens under the Roleadro Galaxyhydro led's compared to the Viparspectra led's, so I ordered a Viparspectra 450 and have another on the way. I think the wavelength of the Galaxyhydro were too much of the "Red" side (700 nanometers+). They are great for starting seedlings but "vegetative" growth is much better under the Viparspectras, plus I can control the wavelengths. For my starts I'll drop the red side down to 20% and bump the white and blue to about 80%.



I moved the lettuces to the Fluorescent Led's because of the mice problem, after these perk up a bit, they'll be harvested and I 'll be done with the greens for the season.




Hopefully I can get this mice problem under control before I start my seedlings.




I'm pretty sure my parsley will recover from the division the other day, but it looks pathetic.



Topped off my basil, yeah I know, I could have done a better job.




The Black Beauties are doing well. I'm not sure if I'm going to cull one or transplant, I really dont have the room.


My Trial Potting Mix seems to be doing fine.




Chives are doing well, I divided these from my garden and I 'm growing them out for my brother.

 

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The cilantro bounced back after a few day.





These peppers have me a bit puzzled, the peppers on the right have been in the grow room since they sprouted, the ones on the left have been on the grow table with the Galaxyhydro Led's then moved to the fluorescent Led's.
The ones on the right are starting to come back but I am curious as to what happened, could it be the Aphids? Could it be the potting mix? or could it be the lighting, temperature? Who knows but I may replace these with the stockier ones.




Looks like we MAY have a little Jimmy Nardello soon.




I'm wondering how long I can go before I need to start trimming the tomato plants. I am going to try and time it to when I can start cloning.



I did move the lights up about 4" the other day.

 

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WHAT!! What is that!!?

















I watered the plants this morning and used the robotic Bee on all the flowers. The Abe Lincoln "Tomato" actually had noticeable growth after only 14 hours.
The entire garage was pretty warm this morning, I had to open the door from the garage to the utility room, high temp in the tent was 88°F.

 

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February 5th, 2019

The weather has been pretty mild or should I say absurdly hot for this time of year, for goodness sakes it's 60°F today and supposed to be 60°F again Friday. I have been trying to keep the temperature below 85°F but it has been hoovering around 88°F and reached 89°F yesterday. I had to come up with a game-plan and quick. I figured venting into the garage was not an option anymore because the garage heats up a good bit, for now I have the basement door open. The basement is a bit cooler than the garage at the moment.

Here is what I decided to try. The ceiling is insulated and the floor joist run horizontal to the house so the hot air is exhausted to the closet in the basement. I pushed up the insulation for a clear path to the other room.

Did it make a difference? Well based on one day I would have to say NO. I checked the temp this morning and it was 88°F inside the tent. I opened up the tent, watered the plants and hand pollinated the tomato plants and the temp dropped 3°F in 5 minutes, so I decided to just leave the door to the tent partially open during this heatwave. As long as it doesn't get any hotter I should be OK.
Next year I can run an intake to the far corner of the garage door where it will definitely pull in more outside air.

Am I being too critical? Maybe.
Am I expecting too much? I don't know, I never done this before.

When I start a project I am willing to invest a lot of time and research and in this case a lot of money, which I really don't have. Since this is my first year, I figured there would be challenges and expense and that next year would be much easier, I am still holding onto that belief, but, and this is a big BUT, I'm at the point where it's a sink or swim situation, I threw everything at this project and have maxed out, I won't be putting any more money into this project so it will have to work.

 

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February 6th, 2019

The new Viaprspectra 450 came in, so I installed that. I removed the Roleadro Galaxy Hydro led's. What I like about the 450's over the Galaxy Hydro's is, I can tweak each individual set of wavelengths. The Roleadros were great for starts, but felt I could get better results with the Viparspectra's.










My starts and greens do great under the 6000k led bulbs in the ceiling.
I adjusted the fan to go on twice in a cycle for two hours each, 16 hours was totally unnecessary.
Arugula, Mustard Greens, Rocky Top Lettuce, Some Bok Choy and misc plants.



Every morning and evening I have been pollinating with the bee. It's actually pretty neat when hand pollinating, every once in a while I see this little puff of yellow pollen. The tomato plants need a good watering about every 24 hours. I top off the humidifier if needed, I believe around every 3-4 days. This weekend I may do some more culling.

Jetstar




Abe Lincoln




Totem F-1

 

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February 8th - 9th, 2019



Replaced my adjusting straps on my ceiling grow light for easier adjusting.

Harvested the Rocky Top Lettuce mix, and some Arugula and was pleasantly surprised by the dinner salad.

Placed the greens back under the lights and watered with a tiny bit of fertilizer.

Topped of a few pepper plants.

Decided to terminate these two Jimmy Nardello pepper plants and replace with two healthier looking ones, then I topped them off.

Replacements

Topped

Topped the soil with coffee grounds in an effort to keep the aphids population down, I'm pretty sure that this is a garden myth but at the least, it will act as a mulch and fertilizer, well thats what I'm telling myself, lol. If the grounds form a shell I'll work them into the potting mix.I still have one back up Jimmy Nardello under the ceiling grow area with the greens.

It was a sad day in the grow room today, looks like a real bad case of BER. I made a slurry of Lime and added that to the all of the plants. I also tossed in a pinch of Epsom salts and in hindsight should not have done the Epsom salts, ooops.
Inconsistent watering, too much Nitrogen, Not enough calcium, who knows? The tomato plants in the trial potting mix and my original potting mix have been affected, I am hoping this problem goes away after the initial fruit set.

 

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On a much happier note, my Rosemary cutting seems to be doing ok on the windowsill in the basement bathroom. The Rosemary is showing new growth.

Topped two of my Jetstar Tomato plants, these tomato plants are for experimenting with.

Found this rogue bean plant, I did plant bush snap beans back in mid December, I'm going to let this guy go and see what he can do.

Added some Neem oil to my Aphid X spray and sprayed some of the plants.

 

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February 11th-12th, 2019


Getting a bit of leaf curl, not sure if this is a problem or not, it may be related to the BER issue. The plants seem very healthy otherwise.

I am getting a lot of fruit set but still have some signs of BER.

Peppers and Eggplants are growing slowly.

Topped Jetstar plants after three days.

 

[GeorgeVance]

Awesome post of gardening with such experiment !! Thanks a lot for this. Already I got good inspiration from your gardening techniques.

 

[Mr_Yan]

Looks great @SQWIB somehow I missed this thread for a few days.

I like the looks of that new clamping height adjustment with the black cord. What are those cleats / clamps / locks called? I've always gotten away with cheap swing-set chain and S-hooks.

 

[SQWIB]

Adjustable Grow Light Rope Hanger

Looks great @SQWIB somehow I missed this thread for a few days.

I like the looks of that new clamping height adjustment with the black cord. What are those cleats / clamps / locks called? I've always gotten away with cheap swing-set chain and S-hooks.

 

[SQWIB]

February 14th-17th, 2019


Cleaned up my Parsley and chives






My Indoor Salad garden is doing real well.







Planted some Waltham Broccoli, Sun King Broccoli and Baby Bok Choy. This is my last attempt at growing Broccoli, this is actually the start of my 2019 gardening year.






I just keep thinking to myself, MAN! I have to put all this stuff away!

 

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February 14th-17th, 2019

The topped Jet Star tomato plants have really come back.





Took all of the tomato plants out of the tent, fertilized with Jobes Organics Vegetable and Tomato 2 - 7 - 4, added some lime slurry, topped with potting soil, trimmed, placed back in the tent and watered real well.

 

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The tomato plants are all loaded with fruit and the plants look very healthy.

 

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I inspected the plants and BER is still a problem, I am leaving the fruit on the plants to see what happens. A lot of the newer fruit doesn't have what I would call typical BER but there is something going on, there looks like little tiny bruises forming on the fruit. Everything seems to be pointing to a calcium deficiency, curling leaves, BER.





My first thought would be stink bugs or some pest, but I don't see any insects, even the Aphids have seem to have dissipated.







Some of the earlier fruits I'm leaving on the plant.





Leaf curl on some of the larger leaves

 

[SQWIB]

February 19th, 2019

I have quite a few tomatoes on the plants and the newest ones don't seem to have any signs of BER yet (fingers crossed).
I have kept the soil fairly moist the last few weeks, or at least I think I have lol. I am not convinced that watering is the problem and I haven't had any plants droop due to inadequate watering. I have barely lost any leaves or had any brown or yellow, everything is very green and lush.
My current setup is the grow bags sitting in 5 gallon bucket bottoms (1.5” high). The problem is that the tomato plants are in 3 gallon grow bags and fit pretty snug in the 5 gallon drip trays so I can't really bottom water or even see if water has made it to the drip pan, there is no room.

When I water the plants, sometimes the water comes out of the sides and lands in the drip tray, so even if I could see water in there, it really wouldn't be a true indicator of the plants being watered thoroughly. I have been going by the weight of the grow bag and using a finger testing for moisture.

The fact that I am using grow bags, increases evaporation. I could mulch the top with cardboard or something but watering is already a PITA.
If I go any bigger with drip trays, the plants don't fit, using a 5 gallon size gives me 4 plants in either direction.
I have been thinking about this all day and recall a pan for a rabbit hutch that may still be in the yard. If I can find that old rabbit hutch, I think it had a 24” x 48” tray, that would be perfect, if not I was going to cut a few more 5 gallon buckets about 6” high and see if that helps, if either don't pan out, I'll look into purchasing a few garden trays to sit the plants in.

I have thought of Global Buckets, earth buckets, wicking buckets, self watering setups and the like. I really want to try and Avoid using 5 gallons worth of media for a plant. I probably could come up with a wicking system using a 5 gallon bucket and the three gallon grow bag but overflow would be an issue without getting into an elaborate setup.
I really want to keep it simple, but if it dont work out using drip trays I'll try using 5 gallon buckets tied in together with a control bucket, this way I'll only have to water one bucket.

I can also do a tray with a Kerick float valve hooked into a control bucket, but don't think that will be needed.
Ebb and flow is out.
Also looked into one of those oasis automatic watering systems but don't think it would help me in my situation.



...... Later that day. Got home and found the tray, wooohooo!


Moved out the plants and wiped up the tent tub floor.









I took some photos when I had the plants out to play.





I haven't really been hand pollinating these much lately but they seem to have no problem pollinating on their own.





First set of tomatoes with BER and a few new tomatoes (fingers crossed).








I have had almost no flower drop and most of the flowers are pollinating with or without intervention.





Bottoms of the above picture, the fruit on the left has potting mix on it from my hands, so far no signs of BER or any thing else wrong with the fruit but it may be too soon to tell (rubbing my rabbit foot).





Soil on the tomato.

 

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February 20th, 2019


Yay, my first Indoor Red Tomato!!! or is it?

Its one of the earlier BER maters, I was taking a picture and it fell off the plant.

Well anyhow, the parsley is regrowing after the hack job.

 

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I got tired of knocking over and spilling the humidifier so I removed it from the tent and will check the humidity in a few days.


February 22nd - 23rd, 2019

Finished up the salad greens to make room for my outdoor plants.

Some tomatoes that I am hoping don't get BER.

Checked the tent humidity without the humidifier and the readings seem about the same as when the humidifier was in the tent, I was a bit surprised but pleased.

 

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March 2nd - 3rd, 2019








March 5th, 2019


The plants are growing like crazy, with the exception of my Jimmy Nardello peppers, the JD's are very sickly looking and they will be trashed when this trial is over. The tomato plants have exploded and I have close to a hundred tomatoes and not one is without BER, not one!

I'm just about ready to call this a $1,200.00 fail as far as growing tomatoes and peppers indoors (definitely a fail for peppers). there's about 6 weeks left for the tent grow, so we will see if a miracle happens.
I will be trying this again next year, with a few changes, worst case scenario I can use the setup to get a jump start on the season.
One good thing is I have a few matured plants to go in the ground come planting time, well, I don't want to count my chickens yet but we'll see how they do outside.

Another bonus is that I can start a few plants and clone them for spring planting.





At the end of this trial I'll post my changes for next years indoor grow.






The parsley finally came back.

 

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March 6th, 2019

The Jimmy Nardello peppers were evicted yesterday, I just got sick to my stomach looking at these things... absolutely disgusting. I was afraid if these were left in the tent any longer that they would infest the other plants.

This is a comparison of one that was in the tent (left) and one that was under my Fluorescent shop lights (Right) and the one on the right was the runt. Just gets me sick.
I was going to wash the plant, remove from the pot and wash off the soil and repot with potting mix but these guys were too far gone.

The one on the right has even put on fruit.

They were put out in the 16°F cold to seal their fate.
The plant and potting mix will be dumped in the fire-pit when making bio-char.

Trying to clone some Cilantro, Some say it can't be cloned and others say it can, we will see.

The fruit production on the Gardeners delight is quite impressive, just a shame it has for nothing thus far!