Mr Teddy Grows Indoors & Out In 2015

[Bapple]

Yaaay! Welcome back sir, I think we all got a bit worried until 420 told us it was Internet issues.

Friends and family in the UK are usually surprised when we lose Internet connection for days on end after heavy rains here. But it's par of the course in these parts.

Have a good day!

 

[Teddy Edwards]

UPDATE (AT LAST)

Hello chums.

Before I get back to moderation duties I owe you all an update.

Firstly, thank you to the Big 420 for letting you know why I was in enforced solitary. Just kept bouncing that baseball against the wall.

Secondly, IT'S PEEJAY! back, Guvn'r. For those of you who don't know PJ, he is the soil master. To my knowledge, PJ was the crucial starter on here of the whole LOS thing. The Budfather of the LOS mafia. The baton has been passed particularly to SoilGirl (bless - hope she's OK) and of course sweet SweetSue. But if anyone wants to find the source of the soil Nile, check his last year's journal. He kept my girls going all last summer. Yes - Last Summer The PJ Saved My Life. When he speaks, I listen. The only thing I've known PJ to be wrong about was when he wrote about Graytail's plants, saying how wonderful they were but because they were undramatic they'd never win POTM. HA!

Thank you for the typically thoughtful and knowledgeable post, PeeJay. You have confirmed my concerns. These girls will remain indoors. When the tent finally goes 12/12, I will use it as a flowering room and if required bring some girls in from outside, but not in the other direction. I can say this with some confidence because just yesterday when I went to the tiny mini-market in the village, what did I get with my tomatoes and cat food? A package containing a couple of seeds:

Hurray and Huzzah.

The weather has turned and spring is here. Paper plates are in the boiler room as I write.

Onto to plants. The 3 and a half week old Blueberry and Mazar have been potted on and are going through a lovely growth spurt. I popped them out from under the lights for some quick snaps:

The remaining four, about 2 weeks old, are fine. A little Mazar (second from left) suffered most from Mrs Teddy's unplugged gig, as you can see, but top growth is dory and hunky:

Soil. I'm very happy with the new seedling mix - there's been no nute burn this time round. Here is the soil I've mixed for potting on. It's basically the simple Clackamas Coot organic mix as detailed by SweetSue.
- One third Peat Moss
- One third Perlite
- One third made of: a third good, black local forest humus. (I am so lucky here surrounded by deciduous woods and able to find rich humus. I look for where the nettles and borage grow.) A third my own garden compost. And a third worm castings.
- To all this I add some Zeolite, the nearest I can get to rock dust. which retains and releases key nutrients. My friend Jannis, who runs the best garden centre down at the coast, kindly ordered it in for me. He knows his stuff. He has a horticultural degree from Berlin University and spent 6 months in a lab there, creating and testing LOS. No better help could be had.

When I potted on the bigger girls, I also gave them a dose of nettle and borage tea which has been brewing for a month, diluted 1 part tea to 20 parts spring water. It's dark and stinky and will last me and the girls and all the tomatoes all summer long.

Here's the mixing area:

A bucket of reps to anyone who guesses correctly what the yellow liquid is in the plastic wine container. It is NOT a Precious Bodily Fluid. It IS something that I'm willing to bet you all use one way or another every day, but very rarely actually see.

Forest humus:

My own garden compost, sweet and rich and full of red wrigglers:

It feels so soft and rich when it's done:

Thank you all for looking after the shop whilst I was gone. Wishing you the very best of times.

Pip Pip! Mr Teddy x

 

[Radogast]

Welcome home Mr Teddy

That there bottle of yellow looks like it'll come in handy for lubricating my wooden eye.

 

[Graytail]

Ooooo, I like your taste in seeds, MrTeddy!

KC 45 and SAGE are on my short list.

 

[SweetSue]

So good to have you back Mr. Teddy. It appears the Greek sun has decided to stay out?

I love your soil mix. We've all gotten better at doing these tutorial posts and I appreciate the way everyone has a different feel about theirs. I'm starting to think we should have a thread to repost these. A bank of ideas on mixing soil. There've been some impressive ones in just the past two weeks.

Zeolite is excellent for keeping even hydration. A stellar choice. You have no local stone masons? Do they use headstones? There should be some source locally for rock cast-offs like tombstones or counter tops. You probably have particles of volcanic rock in your forest humus. How lucky you are to live in Greece. Reading Darwin on worms has already changed the way I think about 'dirt'.


That fertilizer you brewed sounds excellent. Lots of varied micro-nutrients for the micro critters. Borage grows wild there? Lucky you. The most beautiful plants. I used to sit on the ground so I was looking up through our plants. The colors and shapes were so enthralling and it was such fun to watch the bees. HA! That reminded me that we had a collection of carnivorous pitcher plants one year and we would sit out on the balcony and watch flies disappear down those holes. Forgot about that. That was fun too, but in a slightly perverse kind of way.

We missed you. My best to Mrs. Teddy.

 

[Teddy Edwards]

Welcome home Mr Teddy

That there bottle of yellow looks like it'll come in handy for lubricating my wooden eye.

I have no idea of what you speak, bird-friend. But because you made me laugh and because it's you, here's a bucket of reps. It's petrol for Mrs Teddy's scooter which photo-bombed the picture.

Ooooo, I like your taste in seeds, MrTeddy!

KC 45 and SAGE are on my short list.

Gray. Hope all is top of the shop with you. The KC 45 was prompted by Relaxed Lester's garden. The SAGE was recommended by JadeLotus . The rest just have pretty names.

So good to have you back Mr. Teddy. It appears the Greek sun has decided to stay out?

I love your soil mix. We've all gotten better at doing these tutorial posts and I appreciate the way everyone has a different feel about theirs. I'm starting to think we should have a thread to repost these. A bank of ideas on mixing soil. There've been some impressive ones in just the past two weeks.

Zeolite is excellent for keeping even hydration. A stellar choice. You have no local stone masons? Do they use headstones? There should be some source locally for rock cast-offs like tombstones or counter tops. You probably have particles of volcanic rock in your forest humus. How lucky you are to live in Greece. Reading Darwin on worms has already changed the way I think about 'dirt'.

We missed you. My best to Mrs. Teddy.

Sue. We more, errr, how shall I put this, mature people know that we are only standing on the shoulders of giants like Darwin.

All the roofs here are made of beautiful grey slate. I went to one of the many spots where they cut it today and, to their accepting amusement, gathered a large sack of dust. Ah, those crazy English.

A soil mix thread is a nice idea. Build it and we will come.

*****

The final 4 youngsters have been potted on.

We are going to need a bigger tent.

The two older girls are shooting up in their veg soil and larger pots. Time for topping and training soon.

Meanwhile the outdoor preparations have begun in earnest. I call this High Rise:

There are Cookies and SAGE and KC 45 and a Dark Star and some Desfran. Twelve is enough to handle right now. I'll germinate some of the Afghan regular freebies when this bunch are up and running. I'm looking forward to my first opportunity for sexing. I know it's a bit late now I'm in my 50's, but I've heard it's fun.

Peace be with you all. Pip Pip! Mr Teddy

 

[MaxYields]

Holy hell Mr. Teddy!!!

You are goin all in huh? Thats what I like to see Be safe my friend, you grow beautiful medicine and I know how the Grecian government feels about it. Are you going to keep all of those 6 plants currently in the tent, in the tent?

 

[Teddy Edwards]

Max. We're pretty isolated here. A couple of kilometers from the village, way up an isolated track and no near neighbours. Plus I have the fiercest guard dog. I'm most excited about trying a couple of young girls in the veg bed with plenty of good soil and space to grow.

Yes, as per PJ's advice, the tent is like Vegas. What started in the tent will stay in the tent. When the tent finally gets switched to 12/12, and space is available, I may pop others from outside in there if I need some more to flower early.

 

[Bapple]

That's quite a grow Mr T, look forward to following

 

[JadeLotus]

Holy hell Mr. Teddy!!!

My thoughts exactly!

I'm so happy you picked up the Cookies Kush as well as SAGE. Barney's Farms partnered with the tour company we booked with and we received tons of freebies from them including lots of Cookies to sample.

 

[Jaga]

Hello mr Teddy I like that red light
Hey buddy in yer 50,s I thought maybe 40 from a picture you posted what's the secret
The girls are growing up nicely and it sounds like you have picked some nice beans to pop

 

[PeeJay]

Yes, yes, Mr. Teddy. Leave those plants in the tent. Put the new sprouts outside. If the tent gets too crowded you can move one or more outside the first week of June.

I had very nice results with Darkstar (although I've seen mixed reports from others.) In fact I just sprouted two of them to grow out in the greenhouse over the summer. A few Darkstar pics for your viewing pleasure:

 

[Teddy Edwards]

Beautiful, PJ, just beautiful. Good luck this summer. If you start another journal, please let me know. If you don't, feel very free to post any pics you like here.

Well, all 12 beans did their tap-root thing in the plates. They are now in their seedling mix and, I trust, on their way up. They are tucked up in the tent for warmth because the weather has turned windy and chilly (8-10C daytime). When the sun comes out again and they are up, I'll acclimatise them to the great outdoors. The tent is as full as a bull's bum.

I'm delighted with the veg soil and nettle tea. The two older girls are the healthiest I've yet grown with zero problems and the 4 younger ones have also started to motor along. Pictures for your delight and delectation as soon as I have a few minutes.

Be well.

 

[SweetSue]

I'm going to have to track down some fresh stinging nettle this year. Absolutely.

Any day now Spring is actually going to show up in your neighborhood Mr. Teddy. She keeps teasing you this year.

I'll put together the soil thread. Watch for it in my sig. Sometime this week. Maybe tomorrow morning, while they do Dale's angioplasty. It'll keep my mind occupied. Dale in any operating room makes me nervous.

 

[Teddy Edwards]

UPDATE

Playmates.

I am quite pleased with Blueberry and MasterKush at about 4 weeks. They are the healthiest plants at this stage I have yet grown. Fresh, eager, sea green leaves and not a spot of deficiency or burn anywhere. That means I'm happy with this veg soil mix so far. This afernoon the sun came out, although the wind was stiff and cold, so the three of us popped out for some nettle tea and a little light training.

Before:

And after:

Then everyone back in the tent. All the newly potted seeds are precariously balanced within the unavailable space to keep them warm until they break ground. A couple of SAGEs are just showing their little, green backs. Guess who ran out of proper labels? So it's all looking a bit Blue Peter.

The weather's still a bit knife-edge here. Some days are sunny but there's a strong, cold wind on the mountain. The days of riding the scooter in T shirt and shorts are still some way off. Not a pretty sight either in my case. Warmer days are forecast for the end of the week, so I can harden off the 12 seedlings then.

Oh, and just for the sheer pleasure of it - c'mon, don't we all love a tap-root? - I germinated 5 regular freebie Afghanis yesterday and potted them on this afternoon. It's looking like it might be a busy summer.

Peace be with you all. Mr Teddy x

 

[SweetSue]

You're in deep Mr. Teddy.

Lovely pictures. I'm such a sucker for gorgeous leaves.

 

[Bapple]

Looking good Mr Teddy!

Nice bit of bondage there I like watching others training their plants, but I am generally happy for my plants to do their thing.

We are getting low 20s here now so hopefully Spring will be with you presently.

 

[420Brother]

Hey neighbour! haven't dropped by for quite some time now. Our relaxed internet providers finally swinged by and fixed my connection so now i can catch up with your progress
everything is looking amazing, i'm so happy for you Mr.T, you're truly living it

best of luck with your garden this summer, i hope the weather gets warmer soon cause i got my own little outdoor thing going

 

[Jaga]

Good day Mr Teddy

 

[Teddy Edwards]

Kali mera, Playmates.

What a lovely bunch you all are.

Delighted to have you back, 420brother. Yes, I too need it to warm up soon - still around 10C here with sunny periods that promise to stay but are just teasing. I reckon I've got a couple of weeks before the tent really does turn into a scene from Aguirre Wrath of God. I'll pop over and take a look at your garden.

Hope you and your Princess are doing fine, amigo jaga. Congrats again for another MOTM nomination.

On the latest round, 4 of the 5 freebie Afghani regulars have popped and 3 are showing in their pots. A watering for some of the teenagers is scheduled for this afternoon, so the camera will be with me and an update will be posted whilst supper is cooking.

Peace be with you all.