We've shifted (as normal) to the 90's with a lot of 'feels like' in the hundreds.
Sadly all but 1 of my 6 squash died. All but 1 zucchini. My early girl tomatoes aren't making it but the more heat tolerant versions are kicking in. Beans (yellow and wax) failed for the first time. Shortly time to put in 3 more lettuce beds.
I'm still cropping around it all though. 9 tomatoes, 2 banana peppers today.
First year trying to start most from seeds. Learning curve as ecpected.
We've been seeing temps in the high 990's here for several weeks now .Raining infrequently so I've been watering about every 3 or 4 days in the morning before it gets hot . I'm using well water , city water would cost us a fortune . It costs me about 20 cents per hour for a guesstimated 250 gallons . My garden is going bonkers , everything has just exploded in the last
3 weeks . My tomato plants are all loaded , the cucumber is producing well , and I can hardly wait for the green beans to start producing . I've already picked one nice 8" zucchini , just gotta decide how I want to use it . It's about to get real busy for my wife . I do the growin' , she does the cannin' .
I'm ~90 miles NW of Carol, so I'm getting the same heat and humidity numbers as she is, minus the off shore breezes from the ocean and bay that she's getting.
I've got green tomatoes on five of my six tomato plants, plus one red one on the Supersweet 100 bush that I'll be eating later this morning.
The weird thing is the Jelly Bean tomato plant has lots of little tomatoes, but they don't look right. I've grown this variety for years, but these look like mutants. Lobed tomatoes (some look like accordians!) and they seem to be turning yellow instead of red. (Yeah, I know there is a yellow Jelly Bean variety, but the seed package shows red ones.) And those yellow tomatoes aren't ripening; they're hard as rocks. :/
Meanwhile, I'm trying the Blue Lake bush beans in a pot like Boron recommended, and I've got lots of blossoms and tiny green beans coming along. YAY! I won't get a big pot full of beans, but any is better than none.
My dwarf sugar snap peas are gasping their last, but I'm allowing them to mature and dry on the vines since I can't get these seeds anymore. I'll save these and use them for my fall crop plus next spring. Variety: Patio Pride in case anyone sees them from a source other than Scheepers.
New seeds planted and growing for Adelaide carrots and White Sweet Spanish onions. Still waiting for the new shallot seeds to germinate.
Lots of herbs still going, but the pansy plants a neighbor gave me have given up the ghost. In spite of the shady place I gave them, I guess they couldn't handle the heat and humidity. :(
Whew!
I'm giving everything a good watering in the mid-afternoon plus an extra swallow or two for the big tomatos in the mornings. So far, so good.
Nyssa, who will now wait for reports from other locations
I think some of the issue is containter placement and some doing starters too late. The new soil also seems not as good on nutrients.
Unfortumately there is so much runoff, I can't trust inground planting except in the front yard.
Fall planting this year and see what happens. I still have some going fine and the apple crop is HUGE this year. Looks like 1 1/2 bushels.
Bet you are getting pounded by rain now! Inbound here but hitting Newport News which is 40 miles from you I think?
Nyssa wrote: ...
i hope you managed to get them harvested away from the rains and critters that may like to raid them?
around here i have to harvest some pods early and dry them fully inside so they won't disappear.
...
not too bad up here lately compared to how it was going a few weeks ago. i can actually get outside for some hours each day and work in the gardens.
the peas here are mostly done for now but sometimes i can get another crop if they are kept watered.
onions, peppers and beans are all looking to be doing ok.
i'll have to water all the gardens tomorrow morning.
i'm having to hunt a lot this year.
we're cooking some chili now that has ingredients from the gardens. beans, onions, peppers, tomatoes. smells good. :) wish it were done, but i've already sampled some of it because i didn't eat much since lunch...
songbird
Newport News is more than 40 miles from here. I'd only get to Williamsburg at that distance.
Yeah, rain on and off all day, muggy, thunder. Every time I thought I might be able to get outside to get some work done on one of my two outstanding outdoor jobs, BOOM; another wave of rain and nasty came rolling in.
The onion and shallot seeds I planted in the ex-lettuce pots came up, then withered away. :( Too hot even with a couple of waterings a day. Half of my carrot seeds fell to the same doom.
The dwarf snap peas were done, so I gathered the remaining pods for seeds. Then I prepped the same pot, added some fertilizer and sprinkled in a few green bean seeds. I mixed the remainder of this years seeds (not many) with some leftover from 2019, so there's no telling how many will germinate. Good thing I got it done day before yesterday when we had a dry day with more reasonable temperatures.
Today looks to repeat yesterday, so I'll be stuck inside again. Those ugly bushes in the front of the house that need trimming will just have to wait some more. :/
Nyssa, who is cooking a batch of hummingbird food every morning and has already gone through one 10 pound bag of sugar and is well into another
Rain shifted north of me but Monday-friday is a wash now, it looks. This is unusual. Pretty much flash flood zone for past 10 days with another week of it.
I have two window boxes of them this year. I did radishes in the pots early in the season, refreshed the soil a bit and the first green beans will be pickable in a few days.
We have been under water restrictions here, but I am allowed to water things in pots/tubs or new plantings. The lawn can go to hell AFAIAC.
Hi Boron!
Haven't seen you in a while! My garden pretty much subsumed to heat. Earlier than usual. Ah well, some things are trucking along fine still. In September, I can do a second planting of lettuce and a few other things.
I'm lucky to have a well that I can water with . I too plan to plant cool weather crops later , but because nothing I planted this spring did well at all . I have had lousy luck with anything resembling a salad ingredient . Except tomatoes , this year they're bustin' loose .
Technically I have one too but it would need inspection to insure safety before use. It's not been run for over 20 years. Pure blasting heat in Jun did my garden in. Apple crop in and it's looking like 1.5 bushels. Tons of tomatos and later ones still cropping.
Bell peppers doing ok and the banana pepper doing well. Squash didn't make it nor the pole beans. 1 lettuce patch seems to be trying.
Surprise! The rats didn't get anything! The marigolds worked!
I agree. We let go because I was hospitalized for 4 days. Hyponatremia (serious low sodium).
Don was too worried then taking care of me to water and there's little left.
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