Sunday, April 03, 2016
From mint leaves to mint tea leaves
Wash fresh mint leaves thoroughly and let them dry properly for a few days, you'll have some really nice mint tea leaves. Remember not to let wet mint leaves sit under hot sun, they'll die easily.
7 Types of Chilli for Summer 2015-2016
Type 1: Scotch Bonnet
Type 2: Unknown
Type 3: Spike Chilli
Type 4: Unknown
Type 5: Bird Eye
Type 6: Name unknown, not to spicy, wrinkled skins.
Type 7: Name unknown, spiciness unknown, haven't tried yet.
Scotch Bonnet Chill Progress 4 April
Summer is ending, autumn is approach and the Scotch Bonnet Chilli is still fruiting well.
New bird eye chilli seedlings April 2016
I started 2 pots of bird eye chilli seedlings in April 2016 using 100% used ground coffee (decomposed). Posted this photo to track growth. Current month temperature ranged from 18 degrees to 27 degrees, average humidity is about 45%. Let's see how well they will fare next month.
Chilli seeds in decompose bin
The photo shows very healthy bird eye chilli seedings grown in my decompose bin filled with used ground coffee. Zero care and near zero maintenance is required. Young chilli leaves are high in vitamin C, can be cooked lightly using olive oil in a fry pan and served as small side disn.
Spike Chilli
This Spike Chilli pot sprang into action very late in Summer 2016 (around March 2016). It matured very late and started fruiting heavily around March 2016 where Canberra experienced the longest summer and hottest summer month in 30 years.
Spike chilli has rating 5 on the heat scale but I don't feel this species is very spicy. I feel bird eye chill is spicier than this.
Saturday, December 05, 2015
How long can a 2 Litre self watering pot last? Using recycled milk bottle
5 December 2015
This bottle was full 5 days ago. Now is day 6, the bottle still 30% water left in it. I think it can last 3 more days. This is a test to see if the pot can stand 10 days without watering. This method is cheap using recycled milk bottle to provide consistent moisture to the chilli pots.
10 Jan 2016 - Returned from holiday and find many of chilli pots still survived. Several rainy days and the self watering milk bottles saved them from withering.
How to grow mint well
Photo: Pot A
Mint grows very rapidly in summer. There is no need to wait for it to grow too tall, like pot A. I use mint leaves in my fruit juice regularly, keep the pot well trimmed like pot B below so that more young leaves could be produced regularly. Consistent daily watering is very important to keep mint in good shape in summer.
Photo: Pot B
Sign of over fertilsing
Yellowing leaves showing sign of over fertilising. How to resolve this: water more, to dilute fertiliser
Saturday, November 21, 2015
Red Stele Root Rot on Strawberries
One of the strawberries pot is suffering Red Stele root rot. The roots are reddish, pinkish as opposed to the healthy green seen in the bottom photo. This pot will eventually wither and die, fruit growth is stunted. I am not optimistic this can be fixed at all. Why did this happen? I am speculating the overly wet weather condition the whole week last week is the cause.
DIY Slow Watering
Another DIY idea. Buried a water bottle (with a hole poked in it) in the pot and filled up the water bottle. Water slowly dripped out, keeping soil moisture throughout the day. A cheap way to achieve consistent moisture level in soil.
Scotch Bonnet Chill Progress 21 November
What can two and half weeks of full sun position and consistent watering do to Chilli? Quite a lot. Thanks to the heatwave in November, both Scotch Bonnet and Bird eye chilli are experiencing massive growth. Both are more lush and taller now, fruiting and flowering amazingly.
I have to say the self-watering pot takes a lot of credits in this amazing growth. Consistent moisture level in the soil is the key to this upcoming fruitful harvest.
The massive size of this scotch bonnet chilli..simply wow!
Splitting Chilli Plants, November 2015
Strong winds during the week caused lots of damages to the 2 seedlings in a shallow pot. I have moved them to bigger pots, added more soil, shall wait and see how they will fare in the new pots.
Saturday, November 07, 2015
Chilli Pots, 7 November 2015
I am starting a whole new batch of Chilli pots in Spring 2015 (November). None of these pots came from germinating own Chilli seeds. They were bought from Woden Magnet Mart for $15.00 for 5 Chilli seedlings.
These 2 pots look like bird eye Chilli but I can't be sure as I have tossed out the label. They still very small and fragile, I am still keeping them in shaded area, avoiding direct sun light.
This pot is definitely bird eye Chilli which has just started fruiting.
In the self watering pot is Scotch Bonnet chilli, also known as Caribbean red pepper. This pot is growing really fast with the help of some high quality soil from decomposing bin containing mostly ground coffee.
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