Garden Medley

As for many of you with gardens, this has been a very challenging summer for my garden. It has been unusually hot, even for my area, which is generally pretty warm.

Every day it has either been extremely hot, very humid (for the area) or a bit of both. We were over 100 every day for about three weeks, which is quite unusual.

This has really taken its toll on the weaker plants of the garden. My bell peppers, which had been doing rather well, just about cooked on the vine, so they’re no good now. The green beans all just died. The squash and cucumber are struggling. Those that were a little more shaded are still doing a bit better, but not much.

What made this worse was that in June my neighbors did a terrible job of trimming the gigantic pepper tree in their back yard. This thing provided us with the only shade our yard had. Of course, it was a very messy tree too, but considering the heat this year, I do actually miss it. The tree went from being an attractive, but messy pepper tree to a really ugly pepper tree.

The fennel is doing just fine. So are the carrots. Most of the beets look all right, but we pulled one up because the top was looking too much like bark, and there wasn’t much more to it.

This all happened in July. The part of the summer that is usually hottest here is just beginning, and we’re normally lucky to get rain by October. Comes of living in what would be a desert area if it weren’t for irrigation.

That’s how gardens grow, of course. Some years are much better than others. This is definitely not the best year for growing just about anything.

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