Hey there,
How are your gardens doing? What’s gone well this year, and where are you having problems?
Things are looking good for me so far. Like every year, I had some trouble with black bean aphids on my fava beans, but that seems to have resolved itself (even though the affected plants aren’t yielding much).
I’m happy with my onions and potatoes… does anyone know why some of my onion sets are deciding to go to seed?
Wishing you all a great week!
Record setting heat, extreme drought, and plagues of pests & critters have made it a heartbreaking and unfulfilling year of heavy losses as well as low productivity.
Pretty sad year, especially for vegetables. My ornamental stuff is doing better. Most of that is close enough to the house that the deer don’t venture into it, lots of it is old and well-established, and lots of it is composed of natives that can handle the extremes.
Same. I had good early crop of beans and squash but the heat has pretty much stunted/kill everything else.
Funny you mentioned squash because I planted a few plants and managed to get a few fruit this year.
Every other year, the vine borers obliterate them before they really get going. My neighbors’ reaction when I mentioned I was going to try some squash again this year was a combination of “why” and “good luck with that”.
Luckily I haven’t dealt with vine borers. Fingers crossed they don’t find my plot. I do usually get hit with hundreds of leaf footed bugs. Suck my tomatoes dry if I don’t keep up with them
All things considered - we’re very happy with how our garden is going! It’s me and my wife’s first year gardening, combined with a horrible drought in our area and limited free time to work on it we had very low expectations. So basically anything feels like a win! We’ve gotten a million cucumbers, eggplants and beets, a smattering of tomatoes/beans/peppers, and a huge crop of winter squash coming in. We feel like we’re learning a ton, and already have some ideas for what we want to do differently next year!
I just moved over the winter, so I was only recently able to set up one of the two raised beds in the new yard. It is filled with arborist woodchips which are heating up like compost, so I’m gonna let them cook over the winter and fill the rest with half topsoil/half compost for perennial veggies/fruits, and the other will have the same woodchips and Mel’s Mix on top for annual veggies.
My herbs and strawberries are doing okay, but I can already tell that I’m going to have to go to war against squirrels, raccoons, possums, and skunks.
Sweet potato is still establishing (planted after harvesting garlic). Peppers and okra are going strong! And the usual summer herbs mixed in along the edges:
I’m not doing a lot of gardening this year because I’m getting everything rebuilt for next year. So far rebuilt my chicken run, next is a new coop, then im going to install the 2 dozen metal raised beds I bought once I can get the weeds knocked down. Considering building a greenhouse over the space as well.
The stuff I am running this year is doing…… my potatoes seem to have died last week, 2/3 of my raspberries died, 1/4 of my grape vines died… we get a week of brutal heat followed by days of drowning wet. Is just hard on them, and insects are exploding.
I hope this shitty summer means my lawn grass dies the rest of the way this year. I’ve been overseeding with clover for years because it stays green through august when we get real hot and dry. I’d love the clover and violets to take over the rest of it. They already took over under my trees and most of the back yard, and I love never mowing those places. They are adapted for the sort of weather we get here and don’t die nearly as easily from this climate abuse.
Terrible. The heatwaves that are passing by are murder. Thank you, climate collapse, thank you, CO2 producers.
Oh, I see—I have the same problem in another garden, too. I actually only water my vegetable beds when necessary (so far, luckily, we’ve still had enough collected rainwater).
For the past few years, I’ve been using grass clippings as mulch on the beds, which helps reduce evaporation… I’ve become a big fan of it.
Garden is good! So much going on. I’m happy yo nerd out about it for a while.
Garlic harvested this morning! 21 heads. I’ll save the biggest to replant in the fall. Last year they didn’t cure. Fungus I presume. Hopefully not an issue this year.
Onions curing complete. Used a ton fresh. Only four smaller onions made it through the curing process. Have fall onion starts growing now!
Peppers - seem small. I will resist adding additional plants. A few hot peppers visible and growing. Sweet peppers seem to be struggling. Yellowish. Never look happy. There are a couple of tiny fruits just now settling. Not sure they’ll be successful.
Lettuce. Spring plants still going strong just started more. I’ll add shade cloth. Maybe tonight. New lettuce plants recently started. Should have done that a month previously.
Herbs. Mostly out. I have one parsley that hasn’t bolted. I need to start more parsley, cilantro, dill. Sage shrubs are doing alright. I want to plant one and give the rest away. I need to decide where to plant mine. Tbh i kinda want them out of here before the fall plants still swap. They look ready to be up potted again. Basil always bolts for me. Ive been pinching it back weekly and using fresh or drying it. I’m getting some nice dense little shrubs!
Tomatoes are going wild. I need to prune them back again. I have a small salad tomato and a large salad tomato rn. Only one paste tomato plant rn. It’s fruits are not ripe yet. I am considering planting another round of paste tomatoes or propagating the plant i have.
I have a few more things but I’m tired of typing 😂Everybody stay safe in your respective heat waves.
My garden is doing really well. Plenty of flowers in strawberries, huge amount of raw red and black currants… Planted a gooseberry bush and it’s not dead yet, might survive, we’ll see! It has made like 11 berries too. Potatoes look good, beans are flowering… Salads and herbs grow fast. Rhubarb is rhubarb. I also planted some angelica last summer, that looks good too. Gotta be on the look-out for flowers on that one!
I live way above the Polar circle so my progress might seem slow/late, but actually we’re like two weeks ahead of “normal.” Luckily this summer has been cool and rainy, very nice change for the past few infernos.
How are your gardens doing?
Well, the lawn is completely crispy and yellow already, the trees are on the verge of deciding which of their limb leaves to drop first and the privet hedge pulled a full stop in the middle of its main growth period.
So, the good news: I don’t have to mow the lawn or cut the hedges.
The bad news: Only healthy green looking part left is the bee-food-flower-patch, which is the only place I decided to still regularly water…
That sounds concerning. I’m having a similar issue with the lawn (in another garden): It’s completely yellow by now. A while back, I deliberately planted thyme in a few spots on the lawn—it seems to handle the drought a bit better. Otherwise, though, I have to say I’m not a lawn fanatic: If it dries up, it dries up. In my experience, the grass recovers in the fall and spring.
Like you, I really only water my vegetable beds. In the beds, I’ve become a big fan of using grass clippings as mulch. It retains moisture, there’s a lot of soil life active underneath, and since grass clippings contain a lot of nitrogen (shout-out to the composting community!), they also fertilize the beds at the same time.
So far, luckily, we still have enough rainwater collected from winter and spring… but summers are definitely getting drier here, too.
I just put the clipped grass beneath the hedges. Normally disappears within weeks, worms and stuff that feed of it are happy and the soil quality will be improved.
Regarding the nitrogen: I heard otherwise, that composting it in-situ will reduce the available nitrogen and you should add some long-lasting nitrogen source to it, like e.g. horn shavings.Regarding the nitrogen: I heard otherwise, that composting it in-situ will reduce the available nitrogen and you should add some long-lasting nitrogen source to it, like e.g. horn shavings
There’s some truth to that, but it’s a bit more nuanced: It depends on what you’re composting. With substrates that are very high in carbon and low in nitrogen (such as wood chips or shredded wood, if you have your own chipper), the low nitrogen-to-carbon ratio causes the microorganisms that break down the wood (fungi, bacteria, etc.) to draw the nitrogen needed for cell growth from the soil—and in that case, you’re right: As the mulch decomposes, it initially leaches nitrogen from the soil.
The situation is different when using very nitrogen-rich material like fresh grass clippings: These contain a relatively high amount of nitrogen compared to their carbon content, so the microbes don’t need to draw nitrogen from the soil beneath them… In that case, you have to be careful not to make the mulch layer too thick, as the combination of high metabolic activity and high moisture can create oxygen-deprived conditions (this is why a pile of grass clippings becomes wet, rotten, and mushy and no longer decomposes properly). In my experience, a 10-cm layer of fresh grass clippings as mulch on my soil is no problem and breaks down well.
Thanks for the clarification, I see…
I am actually doing a combination of both: the cut down twigs from e.g. the hedge itself and the grass clippings added on top of it after mowing the lawn.
Keeps it somewhat loose and the air circulating, so no risk of oxygen deprived rotting!
musk melon vines are coming up great! I’ll be planting more new plants this weekend now that monsoon is here.
“Elon melon” would sound better, tho.
