If I'm being 100% honest this month I barely even looked at my plants and felt like the most neglectful parent ever. It's been a busy spring and I'm back to loving on them. Somehow they survived:
1 Dry pump – Pump for lettuce dried up, oops.
Spidermites – Residents at this point. I'm going to name the survivors of the last neem spray.
Thrips – Yay summers back!
2 Dry buckets – Nothing but neglect. a few oZ of a 8.0 pH / 5.0+ EC in each.
1 Overfilled bucket – All the leaves fell off my Jalapeno and it drowned. It's what I get for quickly filling it and not even looking to see where it was filled.
Spring has sprung here in North Carolina and I've been enjoying the warmer weather and doing house projects. I got back to my grow last week and shuffled the entire garage around after some spring cleaning. The shelves are kind of a mess but I'm thoroughly loving the new layout and mylar shielding.
I added reflective material around my entire rack and it's a massive increase in PPFD on the edges of my grow. Berries/leaves on the top shelf that were once getting 25-50 PPFD are literally now hitting 200-300 PPFD without adding a single watt of light. It's been awesome and immediately noticeable in growth rates. Not to mention I can walk into my garage first thing in the morning without squinting now. Not pretty looking but insanely effective for $30.
But we have been killing it on lettuces. I only have a few left but was thoroughly enjoying the butter lettuce and spinach but its since gotten too warm and some started bolting. Enjoying the last few heads of lettuce left and I've decided it's time to make way for the cucurbits – I have two seedlings of Spacemaster Cucumber and Sugarbaby watermelon I'm trying to grow indoors this year which will replace where the salad is growing in some creative manner. We'll see how it goes!
Few things learned this winter:
- Under 60 degrees in my grow room cause a lot of issues. It made a lot of precipitation of my nutrients start happening and I feel like all the cold snaps I had calcium precipitate (Even made a post about it until I figured it out). Also, literally all the warm weather plants (peppers, tomatoes etc) grew at a snails pace. Wasn't even worth starting them until the grow room warmed up to steadily 70s. Pretty sure next winter a small heater will keep things warm enough in the insulated garage. The lowest I got this winter on the single digit temp days was 53 degrees, but still too cold.
- Thrips suck more than spidermites. Fight me. Spidermites are almost cute pets at this point. Theyre so easy to manage with 1 tbs neem oil concentrate + 1 tbs dish soap in a 1L spray bottle, shaken – not stirred and they're basically gone after a few applications. They came back but that's again because I've been a terrible plant dad and letting things just go. It took a bit too long to notice them this time. But THRIPS. UGH. Theyre back since it's warm and I'm applying capt jacks dead bug brew + neem oil now and have incorporated a Zeevo bug trap that's working insanely well actually. Theyre somewhat managed now but the damage has been done and I am still noticing new damage and seeing the occasional adult. I know i know, predatory bugs. Once summer comes.
- Strawberries – Still hard! For a year I battled to even get a strawberry plant to live, none the less thrive. Now I'm growing them well but maintaining good berries is proving difficult. Pollinating, fighting pests, maintaining solutions, and everything else has been a challenge without the time. Hoping I can get them in good conditions while great berry weather is abound! I've shifted nutrient ratios around and the new growth is responding insanely well to it. Love pulling off the old stunted, browning leaves to allow new growth in.
- Cucurbit seedlings (Cucumbers, melons, etc) are hands down the most annoying seed starts. I start in rockwool cubes but if you let them sit in a saturated cube at all it isn't going to work. These plants specifically NEED to have a few sets of true leaves before you move them around or transplant. If you disturb them before they will stress and die. If you keep them saturated they also die. Shaking the cube of excess moisture has been the key and checking it twice daily at minimum until its able to get into some sort of container/solution.
I'd love some methods people have to keep rockwool cubes moist without letting them get saturated or require babysitting for a few days until they're established. I'm busy enough spraying and watering my outdoor plants already so having to remember a few rockwool cubes so often (or else 💀).
My small pots of outdoor hydroponic blueberries/pomegranate/strawberries are doing the best though being honest. I'll include them in an April update when they're doing some more fun things than just waking up/being babies
by vXvBAKEvXv
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