🌶️Kashmir Cannabis, Hot Pepper Production, and Land Regeneration, with Dr. Grenskye

9:16AM Jan 29, 2025

Speakers:

Jordan River

Keywords:

Garden Goblin Genetics

brand transition

Instagram censorship

pepper breeding

heirloom strains

terpene profile

cover crops

soil regeneration

greenhouse setup

wind damage

fermenting peppers

IPM spray

culinary peppers

breeding goals

seed properties

Greetings growers from around the world. Jordan River here back with more grow cast, and that's music to your ears. Today we have garden goblin genetics. Red Scare seed CO is back on the line, and he's changing it up. That's right. He's got a new name, a new brand, and we're excited to talk to him about it. Today we talk about growing in different climates, growing peppers, different expressions of different plants that he's working with, and the future of garden goblin genetics. Before we jump into it, though, shout out to AC infinity, baby. AC infinity.com. Code growcast One five to get your savings and keep the lights on. Here at growcast, we appreciate your support, and we love AC infinity. They make the best grow tents around extra thick poles. They've got nice, durable, thick siding. Now they have the new side ports. People have been asking for those in AC infinity list, and plus, they've got everything else you need to grow. They've got lights and pots and fans, and they're oscillating fans the cloud race system. Check out their humidifiers, the cloud Forge. How nice is your humidifier? Maybe it's time to replace that. The cloud rays are my favorite oscillators on the market. And of course, their cloud Line series, what they got it all started with all those years ago, when we were partners with AC infinity, all they made were those inline fans, and they're the best in the game. So shout out to the entire AC infinity suite. They've got everything you need to get growing from fans to tents delights code growcast One five works at AC infinity.com. You support us, and you're getting some badass, durable grow gear while you're doing it. So thank you to all you listeners using code grow cast, one five, and thank you to AC infinity. All right, let's get into it with Dr green sky, thank you for listening and enjoy the show. Hello, podcast listeners who are now listening to grow cast, I'm your host, Jordan River, and I want to thank you for tuning in again today before we get started. As always, I urge you share this show, send this episode to somebody, turn someone on to growing. It's the best thing you can do to help us in our mission of overgrow. And of course, see all the action at growcast podcast.com There, you'll find the membership and the seeds and the classes and all the fun stuff we do today. We've got a breeder feature. That's right, you guys love the breeder features, a return guest, good friend of the show, and also somebody who's undergoing a brand transition. We're gonna talk about all that today. Dr GreenSky, from formerly red scarce eco is on the line. What's up? Dr, green sky, how you doing? Man, oh, doing great. How's it going? Jordan, going good. Man, doing very well. Doing my thing here at grow cast, we love catching up with you and talking about all your breeding work and your farming. We're talking about peppers today. But first, let's get into this brand transition. Red Scare seed CO is no more. You're changing names. Yeah,

figured it was time. I've been facing a great deal of burnout for the past couple of years as Red Scare Seed Company. I've kind of been through a lot, been through a lot of changes. I've seen a lot of change in the industry. Been involved in a couple of lawsuits. It's been a crazy ride. I would just kind of looking forward to changing things up, getting some different marketing out there, and kind of running with something that's a little bit more fun, a little less militant, per se, than red scarec company. Sure, I could see that. Yeah, exactly. So, yeah. Moving forward, I don't know if it'll be early 2024, I would assume I'll, I'll be going in as garden goblin genetics.

Garden goblin baby, you're, you're a goblin of the garden. That's right. I like the art that I saw. Very good stuff. Garden goblin genetics, going to be the new handle as well. Probably switch up your Instagram account. Try to get away from man, the algorithm does not like your accounts, so I know you probably want to get away from

that. Yeah, it's time. I've had my hashtags have been hidden since 2020 so it's really hard for anybody to kind of like find me on Instagram and look up my streams and find pictures, because anytime somebody tags me or anything like that, I can't see the tag. I can't go live on Instagram. They've kept my accounts from going live. So I get people to ask me all the time, Hey, man, will you jump on live with me? And I'm like, I can't. Yeah, totally. I can't jump on live with you. They won't. They won't let me. So, you know, I'm just tired of the sensor and bullshit and it sounded it starts fresh, you know, maybe somewhere down the line, if I've, if I'm working behind the scenes on a strain that's old RSSC strain, you know, I might bring back some old school packaging or something like that. But moving forward, it's going to be garden gobbling from here on out. Nice.

The big shift, everybody. So now, you know, keep an eye out for that change. And of course, when you get that account up and running, do you have that one up and running? What's the handle on Instagram? I

do it is. It's Dr, gobble garden, G, O, B, B, L, E,

I love it. Yes, gobble in the Terps. But.

To the backup, to my backups, backup account. Jesus

Christ, man, I want to talk about IG censorship for just a second. I mean, listen, everybody gets on these shows and they do the same thing. They crow about how it's completely unfair, right? Like this is a, this is a platform that is hypocritical in its enforcement of these policies. Cannabis is legal in a lot of states, and people are doing it in a legal fashion, a licensed manner, and they're getting taken down on this platform that on the same platform, people are skirting, you know, selling sex laws, and posting all sorts of inappropriate content and hard drugs and violent things. And it seems to me like there's, I don't know, I don't want to get conspiratorial about it, but I'll put it this way, we had a grow our first grow cast account impersonator, and we haven't had a lot of impersonators, because I don't think it's easy to impersonate grow cast. There is only one at grow cast. There's no eyes in it that you can double up. There's no anything. But I saw that there was an account at grow casts that was

a fake account, right? So I'm thinking, if

people are getting reported and taken down, why don't I leverage my audience and report this guy and take him down? Well, I had everybody report him, and I know that a lot of people did end up reporting him. Hey, this is impersonating in somebody. Here's the account, here's what it is. Lo and behold, I get an email from Instagram saying we reviewed the account, we didn't take it down, and sorry, you're shit out of luck. And I'm thinking, Red Scare. I'm thinking, how do people get taken down by their haters, if my audience, which, I mean, it isn't like a massive audience, but I've got a pretty dedicated following. Reported this page dozens of times to the point where Instagram actually reviewed it and wrote me. I don't think it was an email. I think it was a like a notification in my in my app, and said, No, we're not going to take it down. I screenshotted it. I'll post it. That's fucking wild Red Scare, and it seems like there's no rhyme or reason to this. So I just don't know what to make of it at this point, I guess. And I know you've been on the shit end of that. You've gotten banned time and time and time again. And I always thought, like, oh, there must be some hater reporting you. But is that really even it? Like, what the fuck is doing this?

Yeah, that's tough. I think initially it could be, you know, somebody's hating and reporting a lot of your posts, mass, you know, mass reporting. And then perhaps it goes through an AI system, and then that system starts flagging, you know, certain words, certain things, pictures, start getting flagged and picked up by the AI monitoring system. And then that's, you know, that's how your page is getting constantly flagged.

It could raise the sensitivity due to the haters, or you're right, but it was like I was thinking, well, here I am hating on this guy, and it doesn't work. So how do they get these taken down?

Yeah, I don't know. I've seen it time and time again. I've had to report fake accounts, and this is something we've talked about. You know, it's like you can report somebody that's running seed auctions and not coming through. They're just scanning the community. Or somebody's just like pretending to be someone else. And it's clear, you know, it's underscores and weird spots and things like that, right? And you know, these people are imitating, you know that they're scamming. And then you report on and nothing happens, because they're not going against community guidelines. But then you post a picture of a plant, or you post a pack of seeds up without a, you know, $1 sign, or for sale, or anything like that, just a picture, which is what got my last account removed, was just a picture of a bud. So weird, and that gets flagged, and that goes against community guidelines. So what are the community guidelines we're breaking but they're not breaking. Yeah, it just makes sense,

yeah. And then some pages post bud picks all day and get tons of engagement. It's like, what is happening here? The only other thing I can think of is that some people might be employing bots. Poetry of plants was talking about this. How, when you get, like, really deep into it, like the big accounts trying to take each other down. They, like, get on Telegram, and there's people who have bots that take down pages, and there's bounties, and it gets real dark, definitely. But I don't think I'm, you know, a victim of that. It's just sad that, you know, like, I get my audience to point out to the platform, and obviously I don't expect anything else from Instagram. They don't do anything about it. So that's really the lesson you guys, which is, don't expect any help from Instagram. Don't expect anything from them. That's what I see time and time again, is people like I said, getting on these shows and saying, Oh, this is so unfair. This is so unfair. Like, of course it's unfair. At the end of the day, it's their platform, and this is how it's gonna be. So I hope that one day, one of these platforms opens up to our community and just lets us be like any other community on their platform. That's all I want. You know?

Yeah, that would be nice and, and there was a time when Instagram was like that, yes. And that's what's crazy, is when we, everybody, kind of shifted from Facebook to Instagram. Instagram, because Facebook was closing down seed groups and and clone trader groups and things like this. So everybody kind of fled to Instagram, and everybody loved the format. And for a couple of years, everybody, three or four years, everybody was good on Instagram. Nobody was getting reported, nobody's pages were getting taken down. And then all of a sudden, you know, honestly, right around COVID time, it seems like everything really picked up. And I don't know people just had extra time on their hands, or if they realize they can make money and take them down accounts or or what the case was, but it seems like there's been a serious uptick since then, and there's been no

that is true. Man, yeah, that's exactly right. And yeah, it's tough. Things were good. You're right. It was like a kind of a kind of a truer, more open algorithm. It feel like you were seeing the posts that you engaged with the most and the stuff you wanted to see. And it's just gotten so much stranger. There is a weird sexualized switch that was switched on. I don't know when that happened, but I think since growing is so male dominated, if you follow grow pages, all your suggested reels are like sexual, pornographic reels, which is really wild. Yeah, it's just strange man. It's so I just wish that like, you know, Twitter or x or whatever it's called now, came out and said something. I don't know if I've talked about this on the show, but forgive me if I have but I'm gonna bring it up again. They came out and said something which was, we're gonna start accepting ad dollars from cannabis companies. Do you remember this I do a couple months ago? And then what happened? Everybody goes, Twitter is a pro cannabis platform, and everybody's like, here's my Twitter, here's my Twitter, here's my Twitter. But what I've kind of seen is just because they are saying they're accepting ad dollars for advertisements from cannabis companies. Doesn't mean that their algorithm is equalized for all content. It doesn't mean that they're gonna share your cannabis post, and that's kind of what I saw over there. I just wish one company would open up and say, Hey, this is a community like any other. Maybe you gotta tick the 21 and Up Box, right? But we're gonna let you do your thing and have your space. I wish that would, that would happen on one of these platforms.

Yeah, that would be nice. It'd be a breath of fresh air, for sure, and I think it'd be good money. We deserve that. You know? I mean, I pay taxes. I pay a lot of taxes. Unfortunately, living here in Illinois, a lot of us are just out here paying taxes with zero representation. And quite the contrary suppression. It's just, it's, you know, it's typical. This is America's got its history and how they treat small farmers and the small guys. And this is, this is on par. No

kidding, dude, rolls off my back. I'm used to the show. Yeah, I like that. I like that attitude. And the final thing I'll say on this, before we get into today's growing episode, is I don't think there's any replacement platform that's going to be cannabis only because that's not what people want. We want a space in the public world, our own little section of it. But when people create cannabis specific platforms, no one else joins it, and then it's going to be really quiet. So I don't know what the answer is. I would love to be more involved in stuff like this, representation and lobbying of these types of groups, of allowing us to do our thing. That would be my dream. So I don't know if anybody has any ideas or anything. Definitely reach out, but, but nonetheless, I'm glad you're still hanging in there. We got the new brand, garden goblin genetics. I'm excited about this. I want to talk about cultivation. I want to talk about peppers. But let's start with breeding. What can we look forward to with garden goblin? Are you dropping this new brand with with some new strains? Well, what can we look forward to?

Yeah, this process, I'm hunting some stuff, you know, just looking for something really special. I don't want to just have a soft opening. I want, I want to have something special. I'm not going to disclose too much right now, but I'm just working with some of you, know, some heirlooms and some, really, what I would consider true, exotic stuff, to see if I can pull some magical turfs out, nice, just something really aromatic and different, while still bringing you know that modern zest, that that bag of pill and that that crusty resin everybody loves, mm hmm, when

you talk heirlooms, and you don't have to give away too much, you don't have to give away the secret sauce. But can you give us a hint? Yeah, I've

got some some stuff for old stuff from Kentucky. I know that's kind of been a hot thing for a while, but growing up in Kentucky, I had a friend whose father passed away and gifted addicts, some of which are probably bunk, some of which are probably amazing. So I've been kind of going through some of those. And yeah, so I'm digging back into the the Azad cashmere lines and some of the original stuff that I did with Azad Kashmir, duck sauce, things like that that are just heavier yielding versions of the Azad Kashmir with a little more potency the Azad itself, it can grow kind of like a cookie structure, little golf ball buds all up and down. The plant that are just really crusted with resin. It's really an amazing plant. I've seen a few people working with it lately, COVID genetics, three. Paul Fox, there's been a few guys that have been running the Azad that I think came from bear frog and Bodhi had those as well. So there were a few of us, guys back in the day that got, you know, gifted the Azad Kashmir from bear frog. And those have been just absolutely amazing, just really fun. A nice cross between, you know, what you'd expect from an Afghani high but that Himalayan open structure with really tight, frosty buds is really fun stuff

that sounds amazing. Man, that cashmere, exoticness, exotic like you said, like I feel like far from a far away land, that's what we're after. But still with that modern twist, that sounds great. What are we going to be hitting it with? What are you looking to pull out of that strain

and add to others? Resin aroma is really cool. The the Azad, I don't know, I went a long time without ever smelling meaty. Terps like true meat. You know, there's a lot of meat breath out there and stuff that, you know, it's not quite meaty, it's just kind of, you know, has that umami thing going on. But this Azad is everything from roast beef to grilled chicken. And I've talked about it before. You've probably heard me talk about it a few times. It just deserves a bigger look, and I feel like commercially, it's not really viable yet because the yields are so low on it, so with certain crosses, like the kasmary duck sauce, where I cross that into like platinum gorilla and Howard the Duck, it really brings up the yield while keeping that rich, savory, meaty terpene profile. Damn,

that's nice. And what do you like that meat, that true meat terpene profile for does that work for you medicinally? Does it work from a tolerance perspective? Yeah. So

my guess is that there's a lot of beta carry offline in there. Probably butcher that pronunciation. But it's really, it's relaxing without being sedated, sure, and long life. So it doesn't, it doesn't, like, just ride with you for a little bit and then lay you down. It just rides with you for a while. And that's something I like in a bud, is, is that it gets you high and it keeps you there for a while without needing to just constantly, you know, take another rip off the bowl, or light up another joint or anything like that, and constantly dabbing? Is this a really smooth medicine, and that's what I love so much about it.

Oh, that's nice. So crossing that with some classics and making a whole new drop here for the new brand,

yeah, definitely digging into a bunch of smaller breeders. Obviously, I've got some stuff from rhizo that is going down nice, really excited about that stuff. Got his double stuffed Oreo peaches in regalia, peach supernova and veg. So I'm excited to hunt through those and see what I can find. It'd be nice to collab with with him and get something going. And yeah, just looking to kind of highlight some some other guys work by finding those, those rare phenos That just really stand out.

Can you share maybe one that you're excited about winding up on the list, that you're potentially winding up on the list? Let's say yeah, a screen. Is that what you're saying? Yeah, yeah, from a smaller breeder. Okay,

yeah, I've got some from firing the whole genetics. Go, G, O, G, across the white caviar that look really incredible.

I like that. Go go. G, I forgot about go go G,

people forget about go G, and that's criminal, because it's really good. Totally. I've had a few finos that were iffy, but for the most part, if you can lock down a heavy OG leaner, it's golden. It's really good medicine. The flavor is just up there. It's just that sweet. Like, I don't want to say sweet, because it's not too sweet. It's pungent, but you get a hint of that sweetness in that heavy cush. And this is really good,

good call, man. I had some good Go, go, G and humble in like, 2015 you know what I mean? Oh, I want to say so I don't I assume it's that old. That's what I remember in my head. I remember getting some really good Goji on the West Coast. Yeah,

we were getting Goji in like 2013 down in San Diego. And I assume it's the same. I don't know when Bodhi actually made the Goji, so it would be interesting to see a timeline.

Yeah, right. It was probably the same stuff all up and down that coach. We were probably smoking the same shit, probably 1000s of miles however long California is, you know, 1000 miles away, right? So that sounds great, dude. This sounds like a fun little pollination, gearing up a drop. Big name change. I'm liking it, man. I'm liking it a lot. What else can you tell us about your your breeding work and this? Change before we get into peppers. Yeah, I've still

been hunting a lot of cherry lines. Really, really enjoyed the Ludens cough drops that I've been working with. I found a just an absolute stunner, fino that's gonna be around years and years. It's absolutely incredible inside or out. It just stacks really hard, throws down a ton of resin and just has that deep cherry Kush aroma that's just intoxicated, intoxicating. It's really nice. Does it smell like a cough drop? It actually, it actually does kind of smell like cough drops with a hint of that evergreen as well. It's incredible. I love it. I love that. I'm also hunting a bunch of cherry jelly from 305 genetics, small dude down in Florida, and really excited about those, hoping I can find something special in that. And I'm sure I will. He does pretty good work. He's he slept on just a smaller dude. But no, a lot of these guys have a lot of passion and haven't, haven't faced the burnout, like some of the bigger guys. And so I'm looking at these guys like, hold on, these guys still have like, mad passion for the plant. They haven't been tainted by the industry or, you know, restricted

yet, like me and you

exactly. So I'm like, I'm gonna, I'm gonna work with these guys gear and see what, what comes to this. I gotta fill in this special shit in here. That's

cool, dude. That's really cool. I totally agree 100%

so actually,

you know what? Before we get into all the cultivation stuff, let's talk fino hunting for a second, because I'd like to ask you, I don't know, some basic questions, some kind of 30,000 foot view questions, and just talk about going through phenos first starting from seed. Do you notice any correlation between seed properties and the buds that come out of them? You know what I mean? Right? Like, people have said, Oh, you know, like big seeds, big fruits, but other people have said, Now, I've gotten really big plants out of small seeds. Is there anything to the seed morphology, or is it just kind of ran kind of random?

Yeah, I think that's pretty random. As long as the embryo is fully formed, I think it's really just a crap shoot. Now, once they germinate, and you see a seedling out of like 10, and it might be the one that catches your eye, if you label that as number one, there's a great chance that by the time that thing's done flowering, that's still your number one. I've had that happen to me so many times, dozens and dozens of times, where I just see a plant in In veg, and I'm like, That's That's it. And you know, it might only be three inches tall as a seedling, but it just has that special something. I go ahead and write the tag and put number one beside it, everything else falls in line. And a lot of times that ends up being your number one. That

is very cool. And when you're looking to check all the boxes, certain things you can tell quite early, right? Like, I've totally had that before, where the first one out of the gate from the seeds always ends up like, like you said, the biggest yielder probably eats healthy, like, eats effectively, which is going to result in more trichome creation, if it's if it's more effectively taking up nutrients and carbon and creating this stuff, right? So, like, Yeah, I like that. I like that. Do you start culling from right away? Like, when? When are your favorite times to cull? I'll

call this is tough, usually around 18 inches. I can I can tell what I want, as far as vegetative patterns and structure wise, how well they handle feedings, misfeeding, dry backs, things like that, really lets me know lower branch structure, because that's going to tell me how it's going to develop and flower, if it's going to stay tight to the plant, or if it's going to branch out some, you know, a lot of these things help me dictate. I could probably go in. I've got some I'm looking at a tray of seedlings now that are, like, 12 inches tall. I could probably go in and send the tray by half and not really regret any of my moves, right? I've probably killed some unicorns. So I don't know if I'm the best to give advice on when to call or whatnot. Because I run so many seeds, it's hard for me to back everything up. It's so a lot of times you have to flower something relatively small, if it's really nice, try to revenge it. Yes, well, I'm also the work the worst person to ask about revenging. I usually just say, Fuck it. Throw it away and just run more seeds, because I just want to see what else I forgot. Oh, it's hilarious, dude. Like, it's not for a year or two later that I'm like, damn, I wish I didn't, I wish I didn't scratch that. That'd be nice to have, right?

Oh, it's true. It's so true. Okay, well, I want to dig into what you just said, because there's some important, distinct important distinctions there. First of all, when you're looking for something that checks all the boxes, you can cull at 18 days or whatever it was you said, because you're looking for the perfect structure. So if it doesn't have the perfect structure, and you want it to check all the boxes, you kick out the ones that don't have the perfect. Butcher. That's a really good way to look at it. Yeah, breeding goals are different, though, right? So somebody asked, this is a funny question that kind of like broke it's a simple question, but kind of broke my brain, which is somebody was talking about hunting. I think they were talking about lime Terps or something, and they said, I want to do a fino hunt for lime Terps. This is a member of my community, and they asked this question. They said, How long do I have to take a strain to know if it has those true lime Terps or not?

And I was like, all the way through cure,

like, right? If you really want to know, you can't be culling at week three of flour because something isn't producing the right smell, in my opinion, because things change so much, right? Do you agree with that

90% of the time? Yeah, I do. If it's just overwhelming with like Jack Terps or something really hazy, and you know that limes never coming, you can probably ditch it. But for the majority of time, you really do have to finish that thing all the way out to know and potentially cure it as well, to know if what it cures into is going to be lime or not. But if you're looking for a specific lime and you want it to smell that way all through flour, maybe you can go in at week four, week five, and get rid of it because it doesn't have that zesty lime that you want. It's just

funny, because he was basically asking, like, you know, to know the true expression of a plant, how far do you have to take it? And I've seen so many plants that smell completely different in week two than week eight, or they just make, like, a hard turn right before harvest. Like, oh yeah, you're just getting sweet, sweet, sweet, sweet. And then, like, week nine, it's like, funk, you know, yeah. And then, like you said, it cures into something else? Yeah,

you know, I had American shit show for a while, and it had lemon Wookie glue in with the American skunk selection and GMO fuel. So for like, week one through six, it was just kind of zesty lemon skunk, kind of that generic Las Vegas lemon skunk shit. Some people love it. To me, it's generic, I guess because I was in SoCal and got so much of it. So week six, it's kind of start shifting, and then by week 10, all of a sudden you've got, like, skunk ass feces and rotting on again, and it's just absolutely putrid and disgusting. So a lot of changes can happen, especially on a 10 week plant, 10 plus week plant, a lot of changes in the in this aromas can happen over a month.

Okay, that's really interesting, because I totally agree with that, especially with the long flowering strains. You said GMO is in that cross Correct? Did I hear you correctly? Yeah. So it's a long flowering strain that tends to drag, and that's probably where a lot of that funk came from, and it didn't want to start expressing until later in flower, because it's a longer flowering strain that might make sense. So suddenly you get hit with these things in week 678, like you said, so fascinating that terpene expression had its own timer, you know, and it didn't want to start expressing that until later on, or maybe some of the more dominant notes fade away, and then you're smelling something underneath. It's just very complex. It is. That's a good example with the American show. That's exactly what I'm talking about. So, so yeah, you're right. Man, like fino hunting. People don't want to hear this, but most of the work, if you're really gonna do it and do it big and do it right, a lot of the work is just labeling everything, right, taking studious notes, getting that revenge down, like it's a bunch of hard work,

right? It really is. Yeah,

I bet you're always in the garden, labeling shit and tagging shit caught. It's probably endless. Yeah, I'll

be taking cuts after this and transitioning things and seeing if I've got anything else that you know is the next keeper.

Yeah, I feel you. So any other like general tips for Pheno hunting, yeah,

before you go into your Pheno hunt, just go ahead and set a list of goals. See what you want from the plant. What do you expect from the plant? Um, for example, I'm running one of my crosses. It's um, it's got SFV OG in it, Wookie. And then one of my crosses, Royal Tenenbaum. So I knew right off the bat that I wanted something that has better structure than the s, f, V, O, G that's in the sun raw, and something that wasn't quite as tall as my tenon balm. So I was able to call the majority of my plants at like week five, and then run with what I had. And I found something really nice in that. So set yourself some gold See, see what it is you want out of the plant. Make a list, and then if you start noticing a plant isn't, isn't hitting the checks, you know, isn't checking off the boxes, then get rid of it and move on, because it can take a lot of time, and you know, you don't want to waste your time with something that might be nice. This is what you're looking for. Yeah, if you're trying to fill, if you're trying to fill a room with a cunt, and you're trying. Trying to find you know that specific, specific fino for that room, that that would be my suggestion.

That's exactly right. The clearer that you are on your goals, the more easy every decision along the way is going to be exactly grow, cast membership, the order of cultivation. Our little community of growers, we would love to have you in our ranks. We are a group of positive and like minded growers, and we're here to help you in your garden, regardless of your growing style. If you like this show, you will love grow cast membership. Go to grow cast podcast.com/membership, and get in on the hundreds of hours of bonus content that's archived and waiting there for you. You have a weekly live stream in Grow cast TV and the AMA twice a month. That's an Ask Me Anything, where we take care of all your garden questions, plus tons of giveaways members only discord and so much more. It's all waiting for you. I would love to have your support and smoke with you on our Discord and hang out with you in the chat. So check out growcast podcast.com/membership get in on the members only discounts, all the giveaways. I'm in the chat every single day, we got tons of helpful moderators and members waiting to be your new growies. So check us out. That's grow cast podcast.com/membership, grow cast membership, also known as the order of cultivation. Our little fancy name. Hope to see you inside our ranks. I appreciate all of you listeners, and of course, overgrow happy growing. I want to

talk about gardening. I want to talk about your garden. I want to talk about growing outdoors and what you're doing to regenerate your land. I remember you talking about how you're working your top soil when you first came on this show, like two years ago. So we're going to get a long standing update on that. But first the important stuff, how are the peppers? What's going on with these peppers? Talk to me about the peppers.

Oh, they're doing great. They're taking their sweet time, making me wait. But they're doing really good. I've scaled back the amount of super hots I grew this year. Last year was almost nauseating with the amount of heat that I grew. So this year I went with a lot of Tabasco, cayenne, Arbol guajillo, just peppers that have more of a culinary purpose, as opposed to just like melting your face off.

Yeah, I think it's a good move. I got some tabascos going myself. Baskets

are so to grow too. They little, little bitty pinkies that just kind of grow up, right? They're, they're fun to watch.

Yeah, exactly. I love them. I absolutely love them. So you breed your peppers now, I do on occasion. Yes, I want to talk about this because I want to convince some cannabis growers at home today to grow some peppers of their own. And one of the reasons that we suggest growing peppers in the breeder class is because you can completely understand how breeding works. First of all, it's so easy and fun, but if you're not really willing to take that step with your cannabis plants. Grab yourself some peppers and start cross pollinating them. Can you talk about that? And can you talk about the, what is it called, the demasculisation process, or whatever?

Yeah, breeding peppers is a really great way. It's just a great visual representation of a genetic breakdown. So for example, I've got some chocolate Ghost Scorpion out right now. One plant growing is growing just true to the red boot loss side of things, and just long red peppers. And then the other plant right beside it is growing short, squat, really warded knotted up seven pot cell peppers. So your genotypic variation is going to represent itself directly in front of you. You're going to be able to see how each allele carries itself through the line. And it's just really cool to see. I think it's probably easier to see that representation of genetic breakdown through peppers than it is in cannabis, because cannabis can be so muddied at times. Sure, yeah,

it's way less. Like, you're right, it's, there's so many more compounds that can be produced. And, like, I totally agree with that. So you can really see the distribution of the different characteristics, but they are not male and female like the cannabis they're not separate males and females, like the cannabis plant, these peppers. So when you want to cross two, you have to, like, choose which one's going to be the dad and which one's going to be the

mom. Yeah. So last year, in our greenhouse, we only grew two varieties in the greenhouse so that we could cross those two together. I didn't want any cross pollination from anything else going on, so that was the easiest way to do it, and it worked out great. So this year is more open. I'm probably, I'm not going to be keeping many seeds from the greenhouse this year because it would be too hard to track what, what there's so many pollinators in the green. House that, you know, there's, there's going to be some, some big variety in the plants, I would

assume, yeah, that's a good point. When you This is really easy to do with, like, just a few plants, because when you get on a scale, it gets insane. But you can get into those flowers, you know, remove the male parts for to be the pollen receivers, and then leave the male parts on the ones you want to be the pollen donors, and they self pollinate as well if you leave both parts, so you really end up with a lot of seeds, right? You do? Yeah, oh, man, I love it. So why should people grow peppers? What peppers would you recommend? My audience starts with that's a good question,

yeah. So it depends on your heat. Heat tolerant, if you like the challenge of a really hot pepper, grow some ghosts out, you know, grow out some some Trinidad Muruga Scorpion, or something that is appealing and and looks cool. There's so many cool peppers out there right now that, I mean, I get lost in it. It's just another genetic world like cannabis, where the varieties are so in depth, and there's so many different varieties out there and so many different breeders that it's really hard to keep up with what's live at times. But, um Yeah, find a plant that that you like and just grow for it. If you like to, if you like hot sauce, grow a bunch of cayenne, grow some Tabasco, get, you know, buy some bourbon, or, you know, a piece. I don't know if you can buy chips from bourbon barrels, but I had a buddy that worked at a distillery and just gave me a whole ass barrel. So I'll be taking shavings from the inside and infusing that in with a lot of my peppers, you know, for my sauces

and things. Oh, my God, that sounds amazing. Man, yes,

find something that works for you, like culinary laws. PvP farms sent me some Jamaican Scarlets, and they're beautiful. And I cut into one, and was expecting a lot of heat, and it was just, it was really mild. The flavor was really nice, pepper flavor and just a really mild heat. My nine year old ate it, you know. And so there's a different pepper for everybody out there. And they're fun to grow. Then you can make your own if you even if you don't want to eat the super hots, grow some super hots. Ferment them. Use that ferment as, you know, as an IP Helm. It's great, you know, to just switch things up and and use that capsaicin that the plants giving you. I

love that. One of my favorite products was a pepper ferment extract. I don't think he many. He manufactures it sometimes, but he, I don't think he's selling it all the time anymore, but it was a bug be gone by Jack Green's garden proc Not, not Jack's dead bug or Captain Jack bug be gone, and it was a pepper ferment. And I was like, I'm gonna start growing some goddamn peppers. Is that the same as fermenting a hot sauce? So to make a hot sauce, I just learned this. It's just water and salt. Is that the same for making a IPM spray in your garden? Yeah, same

thing. I'll even do garlic and onion. I'll take all of the steps that I'm going to use for a hot sauce, and I'll throw that in to my IPM ferments. And you can use dry peppers. We dry we last year we had so many chocolate goats and Trinidad scorpions that we I mean, you can't eat them. What are you going to do? You know, you use one and some sauce, and it's, it's hot for years, so like, we dried them, and then you can take the dried ones, reconstitute them with some water and ferment all the same. That makes a great IPM, because, you know, you're going to lose a little bit of flavor with the dried peppers, but they're still good for the IPM, yeah,

exactly. Man, that's some, that's some powerful stuff in the garden. Peppers also contain those natural oils, so I think it's a good I really do think it's a good option for preventative

Wait, weigh your peppers out, and then add, you know, three to 5% salt by weight back into it, and then top it with water and burp it for the first week, and then after that, about once a week, and that in your golden after about a month, you'll have a good ferment. You can either sauce it or, you know, blend it and strain it and use it for, uh, sprays. So

I just, again, I just realized how easy this was to just, apparently, put it in a jar, salt and water, like you said, some other mixes in there, and then, bam, you got hot sauce. I didn't know fermenting was so easy. It just uses the natural bacteria on the surface of the plant and in the air. Fucking wild man. How have I not done this before? How have I not done this before? Don't feel bad.

This is really my first year just getting into heavy ferment. We've done some boot fit and things like that in the past, but this is my first year really fermenting peppers. So

yeah, I've grown the tabascos right now. So I'm really excited about that, and the audience is going to definitely hear updates. So forgive my pepper updates.

I'll have to send you some bourbon shavings from this barrel. Dude. Hook

it up. Oh, yeah, exactly like I said, I'm throwing all sorts of shit in there now, so I'm excited. Uh, Jordan rivers hot sauce coming at you. Oh, yeah. So you're growing outdoor, you're growing indoor. Let's, let's now talk about this update on your farm. Yeah, like I said, I think the first episode you brought up how you're growing in containers, and you have a history of growing indoors and outdoors, but on this, on this farm that you're currently staying on, you're trying to regenerate the topsoil. Illinois, they do a lot of, I don't want to say factory farming, but, but you know what I mean? Traditional like salt based farming, they do not cover crop over the winter. They let their corn and soy fields lay fallow. They've done a lot of damage to that top soil. Tell me about how you've been regenerating your land and how that's going.

Yeah, it's taking a while. We had to excavate. When we built our greenhouses, we were new to the, you know, to this property, so we didn't know how the washouts were going to handle over winter or anything like that. And so we had to choose, you know, a plot at the end of the winter. And you know, the plot we didn't choose needed some serious remediation or rejuvenation with the soil and the topsoil. It had basically all been stripped off. Everything that grew up there just died instantly. So we brought in a literal ton of worm castings, bunch of compost and manure, wood chips, and just initially tilled it all in, just tilled every bit of it in, and then left it with some straw on top. And then went back and planted cover crops. Cover crops really struggled. At first. Everything struggled. Our corn, you know, we were just growing the corn and some wheat just to die up there to leave its root mass, and nothing produced for us. Everything was just dead the first two years. Wow. But we've, we noticed, you know, some microbial life coming back in last year and things like that. Yes. So we continue to bring things in, planted radishes, kale, things like that to just leave up there this year, we've actually got a few crops up there that are they're struggling, but they're going to make it and so by next year, now I know what needs I did, to bring in a little more calcium and things like that. So it's just been a constant, just just updating and replenishing the soil for what it needs. It was really stripped of all its nitrogen. I put some hemp up there the first year, and the phosphorus was basically absent. The stems went purple immediately. So pest pressure was really high because the plants just didn't have that biome, and the roots build anything up. So this year, everything is looking really good. We've actually been able to grow in the ground, in the greenhouse for the last two years, because that was our main concern, was getting the soil, the topsoil and the soil and that, you know, back up to par. And this year, everything we put in the ground is pretty much surpassed everything that's in the pots. So I'm not so sure that I'll even use containers anymore.

Man, it's that long game, you know, it's the long game

and, and it's not even that long, you know, two two years, three years. It seems like a long time when you're sitting there looking at a dead field and wondering, you know, nothing's growing here. What am I going to do about a farm and everything's fucking dead?

What the fuck totally is this even gonna work? Is this shit even working?

You bring in, you bring in the good stuff, and it attracts the good stuff. So, you know, we brought in a bunch of compost and worms and, you know, all the wood chips and and now there's, now you dig into the topsoil, and there's, you know, there's a little ecosystem. There's a little biome there. So it's cool.

That's amazing. And then year five, things are just going to be humming, yeah,

yeah. We're going to do some hugle beds and things like that. We didn't want to jump the gun and and dig in again and do the hugel right away, because I wanted to kind of see what the needs were, assess the needs and all that. Plus, yeah, just didn't have the time, I didn't have the manpower. It's that simple sometimes, yeah, man.

And, like, I totally agree with that, with that perspective. And you were also working against, like I said, you had to regenerate that land. It wasn't just wild that you were then going to kind of cultivate and make the toy, the soil tillable

or farmable? Yeah, in this land, I mean, even before we had to excavate it, it was really rocky, just heavy clay. That's, that's where the radishes and the turnips, like that gun play. They really do a good job of breaking the clay. And then once, you know, you cut the tops, leave the leave the roots, you know, it really builds up that top soil and brings in the worms, and really speeds things up. I

love it, man, I absolutely love it. It's the same thing I saw in the coffee farms down in South America. They told the same story, you know, hard the first few years. And then things start turning around, and then you have a sustainable. System and and I like that with the mulch, with the wood chips, the cover crop. What do you like to use as a cover crop? I know it's, you know, area dependent and all of that. But what worked well for you as a cover crop outdoors?

We did, we did clover. A lot of heavy Clover the first year, some wheat, some rice, some barley, you know, we just wanted to get a mix of things in there, really. This year, it was a lot of radishes and turnips, again, just to continue breaking up any clay that's down, you know, down there. And so that was a big one, Marigold, you know, just go ahead and get it established up there and things like that. Oh, nice corn. Corn for us, initially was a cover crop. It doesn't seem like a traditional cover crop. But it was even the plants that only grew to be, you know, 12 to 14 inches tall, still had a root system. They broke down. They became mulch, you know, compost. So all of that, you know, depending on what stage and what level your ground is at, I think depends on what cover crop you might need to go for. That's

an interesting thought. And I imagine the corn would have a nice mix of the green leaves and a lot of lignin. It's like, almost like wood falling yeah at the end,

yeah. And then they, they have those aerial roots, they kind of come up, you know? And so that helps as well. Okay,

that's interesting. Very interesting. And then, like you said, the radishes and the turnips, things of this nature really good for breaking up the soil and aerating the soil, right? If it's car hard and compacted, yeah,

we did soybeans as well. You know, just to fix some, you know, just pick some nitrogen in there.

I love it. Playing the long game and dealing with the elements, you know, like you have to work with what you have. And you know, Southern Illinois not the most hospitable environment. Just last night, you got wrecked by some, some wins, didn't you?

Yeah, yeah. Nothing too serious. One of my little breeding plots got hit. I had some plants over, but they perch right up, yeah. I mean, do

how do you deal with that? Are you like me? And you stake and you don't stake enough, and then the wind comes and it kind of pushes all your shit over. Do you recommend people get inside a greenhouse or a structure if they can, if

you can, it's nice, you know, it protects you from the elements. It can give you a little bit of a cleaner product as well. You know, this year, we laid down fabric in the greenhouse for two reasons. One, to keep dust down because of our location, the cover crop is kind of hard to maintain in the greenhouse at times. And if it dies back at all, it gets dusty quick. So we laid down some cover crop this year and then went back and put the fabric down to just kind of get a nice blanket. And eventually, what we'd like to do away with that fabric and just go, you know, natural, but for now, it's what's working for us. So if you can do a greenhouse, you know, you might even a small one, or a small shelter, it might, it might give you a little bit of a better product. For a lot of people, that's not an option, and I totally understand that it wouldn't have been an option for us. But I think I've told you this, we signed the contract on our greenhouse two weeks before we found out that our hemp was stolen. So the timeline that had our hemp been stolen two weeks prior, we would have never signed the contract on greenhouse. You know, it kind of derailed plans and everything, but Yikes. Back to the topic, I think, outside staking, is everything trellising. Staking, you know, the plants that took the hardest hit today were either weren't faked at all, because I was like, this won't need it. It's growing, you know, pretty sturdy and upright, or it's the, you know, either not staked at all or not staked. So if you if you can get a good stake in the ground and then build off that and trellis everything. I've seen a lot of people use five gallon buckets of concrete in the bottom half, and then you put up a fence post, and then use that. Whatever you can do to get a secure structure to trellis your plant with is going to help it. You know, through any of the storms. You know, Mother Nature is going to have her ways. She's, if she wants to crop up, she will. We all, we all know this. It snaps the branches off. You know, trellis plants just the same. So a lot of it's just a roll of the dice. You know, we play with Mother Nature. We put our plants out there, and we kind of have to, we can do some things to prevent trellis and put up support systems. But at the end of the day, we're still, you know, at the mercy of the weather.

It's tough there. Man, you're dealing with moths, you're dealing with wind, and you got to stay vigilant and survive the elements. You know, I think you're smart to get in a structure if you can, like you said, but, uh, sometimes there's, just no escaping it. Even getting indoors, you're still subject to your local environment to some degree, to a lot of degrees. So yeah, it's just one of those things, man. So before we wrap it up, what's the goals with the farm? Anything else going on that you're excited about, anything else you want to tell us before we let you go and get back

to planting? Yeah. Just working on new new streams for this garden Goblin, getting testing done, pictures, documentation. It's been a real pain in the ass with documentation. A lot of my latest drops, I would post pictures up and they'd get removed immediately. It just It became clear to me that it was time for a shift and to focus on something else. So, you know, I've, I've thought about teaming up with a few growers, or something like that outside of the state, potentially teaming up, making some trips out, and seeing what we can do together, all in all, for the farm here, just on the same path, you know, replenish the soil, get things back to the way they should be before, you know, the previous owners came in and wrecked things and and then, you know, we had to excavate. We didn't help either, just setting the setting the land back to where it should be. So there's somebody, if somebody was to come in and take this property over for us, you know, we've got the fruit trees that are like healthy again, because they were diseased when we moved in. You know, we've got the topsoil that replenished so somebody can come in and basically have something set up and ready to go, and won't have to struggle for years, like like we did when we moved here.

Nice. Man, I love it. Leave the land better than when you found it. I do that quite a bit. That's great. Awesome. Man. Well, listen, we are excited about the new brand, about the new drops, and we're rooting for you out there in in Southern Illinois. Anything else you have for us? Where can people find you? And, yeah, just tell us where to get at

you. Yeah, right now you can find me still on Instagram for the time being. Red Scare, Seed Company, 2.0 and Dr gobble garden, which will soon be my main page. That's it. Right now. My website's down. I'm in the middle of rebranding and getting logo designs and and getting my my new company going. We

look forward to it, man, go. Give them a follow right now. Audience, the new account soon will be the main account, and don't miss it. Stay tuned for the next episode, of course, with Dr GreenSky. Thank you for coming on the show today, man. We always appreciate the updates, and we wish you best of luck on this transition.

Thanks for having me, dude, always fun to stop. Always.

Thank you, dear listener, and we will see you next time. Be safe out there. This is Dr green sky and Jordan River. Signing off. Be sure to follow us. Check us out at growcast podcast.com you know what to do. Most importantly, be safe out there, everybody and grow smarter. That's our show. Thank you so much for tuning in. I appreciate all of you. Before we wrap it up, of course, I need to shout out rooted leaf nutrients. That's the right rootedleaf.com code growcast for 20% off your Smart Carbon nutrients, no pH ing, with rooted leaf, I just let it rip in my pro mix and it goes doesn't kill your worms, doesn't affect your biology, loaded with beneficial bacteria and all that good stuff that feeds the fungi in your soil. Rootedleaf.com they've got their brand new lush green that's their nitrogen input, and it is new and improved. If you haven't tried rooted leaf, give it a run. Give it a try. You don't need to pH it. You are gonna love the results. And you get 20% off, huge discounts with code grow, cast@rootedleaf.com so thank you to rooted leaf for being our partners, and have a good time with that. Smart Carbon, heavy rooted leaf nutrients, rootedleaf.com code, grow, cast, thank you for tuning in, everybody. I am done with my classes. I am excited for the rest of the year and the trip to Hawaii and beyond. So don't touch that dial. I've got some great stuff coming at you. Thank you for tuning in, and I appreciate each and every one of you. Be safe out there. Everybody see you next time you

there's a different paper for everybody out there. I.