A 400-watt lamp will not quite adequately cover a 4x4 area, more like a 3x2. You might be able to squeeze 3.5x3 with stuff like Mylar on all four walls.

Secondly, growing in a 2-gallon bucket will be an exercise in futility. It needs to be at least 5 gallons. Two gallons might work for hydro but in soil, your plants will be completely rootbound.

You could go with 7-gallon nursery pots and fit nine of those under a 600 watt HID (IME, use MH and then switch to HPS if you wish but using just HPS will give you very leggy plants). HTGSupply has some decent prices on 600 watt systems.

YMMV,

Mike

Hi Mike, thanks for the suggestions. In the last few years Ive noticed something in my container peppers that is leading me to believe 2 gallon containers would work out well. Typically, once my seedlings are big enough I transplant them into 1 gallon containers- then move up to 3 or 4 gallon pots.

In several instances, when Ive been to lazy to transplant them out of the 1 gallon pots, they have started fruiting... and started fruiting really early too. Ive had the exact same plants, one in a one gallon container and another that I did transplant into a larger one ... with the smaller plant fruiting earlier and doing just fine.

Certainly it is rootbound, but for some reason it fruits earlier and does well. The plant transplanted into the larger container of course goes on to grow much larger... but it fruits wwaaaayyy later - ultimately yielding more of course. However, the plants in the 1 gallon containers grow to a smaller size, still producing a fair amount of fruit, and staying manageable. Ive had this happen with my habs.

Has anyone else noticed this with their hot peppers? Two years now Ive noticed this happen. Its almost as if once the plants fill the pot and get rootbound they start budding and flowering, whereas if put them in a larger pot they just keep growing vegetatively - until filling the container... at which time they then start budding and flowering.

Ive even had plants that are in small pots, that were flowering, with one or two pods developing stop producing fruit once transplanted into a larger container and just grow vegetatively ... until a month or so later where it resumed fruiting. The existing pods sat and matured normally, but the plant dropped all flowers until it got much bigger doubling in size at which time it started flowering and fruiting once again - Im assuming it filled the pot with its roots.

Again, Im not sure but it just seems to keep happening. Plants kept in smaller pots fruit and flower earlier than others in larger pots.

This is the idea behind this grow. I figured Ild go with smaller pots, which would keep the plants size down and help with light penetration.... and if my hunch is correct would help them to start fruiting a bit earlier. Either way they certainly will fruit in those 2 gallon containers ... even if the time frame isnt any earlier... but it will keep the plants size down. Ild prefer to have more smaller plants then fewer larger ones due to light penetration and available coverage area.

Then again, if I would be better off going with 6 plants in 5 gallon buckets rather then 9 plants in 2 gallon buckets .. maybe I should switch to that route.

What are your thoughts on this?? Anyone else notice anything similar??? Any suggestions Im all ears!??

ozzz,

It's not if a plant will develop flowers and set fruit in a small pot, I've accomplished this in a nine-ounce plastic cup and even a 3" nursery cell. It's the quantity and quality of the fruits. Not saying you cannot do it in 2-gallon buckets - if you can arrange the right Cation Exchange Ratio, keep enough nuits in the soil, provide it with the water it needs, it's doable. But IME, you will need to really micromanage each container and even then, I don't see nine small pots producing anything close to what you would get from fewer plants in larger pots.

Again, YMMV.

Mike

One of the nice things about peppers is you can change it's growing habits by changing the nitrogen levels. Keep the nitrogen levels high and the plant won't flower. When you want it too just stop fertilizing it and it will go into flower right away. Also you can use shop lights to grow for root development rather that leaf growth. Something else you can do to increase your light area is take a strip of sticky back vecro and tape it around the middle of the bucket. Use the other side to pull the branches down and stick to the ribbon round the middle. This will allow you to grow a large plant in a one gallon bucket that's about 20" high and about 24" wide. Stop fertilizing it with nitrogen and it will go into flower and you'll get a nice harvest for less electricy and less space

Interesting.

The max container size I would be looking at regardless would be 5 gallon buckets. If switching to 5 gallon containers ... I certainly would have to spring for the 600 watt system. How many plants do you think I could effectively fit under that 600 then?? You really think 9?? I gotta think the plants are going to get pretty big in 5 gallons for an indoor grow and Im not sure a single 600 will cover that area. I guess effective coverage area is probably around a 5x5??

I appreciate the suggestions guys!

All my toys officially came in. I got the grow tent, a secret jarden DR120 (48"x48"x78"), a no-name brand vortex type fan @ 424cfm, with the 6" aircooled hood and ducting. Here she is on a couple dry runs. The 600 puts off an insane amount of heat compared to the 400 I had used before. Holy sh$t! As of now I have it vented into the same room its in. After 4 hours though that rooms ambient temp shot up to 98 degrees! No joke ... the inside tent temp was also 98 deg so that tells me that my vortex is more then adequate since its enough to keep the tent at ambient temps.

The next step is to vent out the window that is located behind the tent. Either that, or vent into the heat duct that is right above it. After all winter is coming, Im only in a 1200 sq foot apartment and if that freaking light can push a 14'x15' room to 98 degs (from 72) inside of 5 hours... possibly it could heat the entire apartment to 68 deg or so?? Who knows... but Im gonna give it a shot! lol ... only question is if the 424 cfm vortex is powerfull enough to push heat throughout the place. I wonder how powerful typical furnace fans are... anyone know??

Anyway here she is ;)

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The seedlings are coming along .... about time to give them some week ferts though.

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One of the nice things about peppers is you can change it's growing habits by changing the nitrogen levels. Keep the nitrogen levels high and the plant won't flower.

That's just not true IME. When the plant stresses from being root bound it will flower and fruit. That's what plants do. It's in their genes. Your picture pretty much says it all.

........ and here we go. Tonight I transplanted the seedlings. Instead of the new digi 600, I rigged up my old magnetic ballast 400 into the aircooled hood. I will keep the little guys under the 400 until they are ready to go into their 3 gallon containers. At that time, I will not only transplant them into the 3 gallon containers ... but I will swap out this 400hps for my new digi 600. I figure at this stage they dont need the extra lumens quite as much, and it will save a smidgeon off the electric bill.

I have them about 20" from the aircooled hood/400 combo. In the next few days Ill start to lower the hood slightly and let them grow into it. Ill probably transplant once they hit 8-12". Then its into the 3 gallon containers and under the 600HPS (you can see the 600's socket in the rear corner of the tent ready to swap out.

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A few days after being transplanted and basking under the HID and they are looking happy. Tripled in size and reaching for the stars :)

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3 weeks after they have been transplanted into these 3 gallon containers:

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where does the excess water go? doesn't it leak all over the floor and out of the tent when you water them?

Nope, the tent has a liner, if you look closely you can see it. The water just leaks out the holes a bit. However, I dont usually water to run off anyway. If I do get a little run off its just a bit. Ive been giving each plant 2 quarts of water and at that amount I will get a bit of runnoff out of each pot but not much...

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very cool they are nice and thick, how goes the exhaust into the heat ducting,