July Potager Ramblings ... After The Heatwave

July 05, 2021

July Potager Ramblings ... After The Heatwave

Whew, that was a doozy of a heatwave! Beyond glad to be back to regular temperatures and a whole lot less watering and worrying.

Despite it all, most all the food crops came through just fine, and some even thrived. The heat lovers like tomatoes, peppers, eggplants, and squash loved it!

Others did not like it at all... The almost ripe blueberries cooked right on the bush and a few of our lovely King apples are black and scorched from the heat. I say this casually but my mind is blown, never have I ever seen fruits and berries cooking in situ!

For those who have a lot of early blueberries, this would have taken out their crop. I got off really easy as only a few berries on one bush were affected.

I heard that some had their potatoes cook in the grow bags and many had issues with raspberries turning white with sunscald.

My roses needed a lot more water to keep their blooms going than I could give them on the acreage. They were all thriving, blooming so amazingly but most of the flowers went limp or crispy in the heat.

I will work on getting them deadheaded this week so that they bloom again beautifully in late August. If yours are really lanky and tall, take them back farther down the stems when you deadhead to bring them back into check.

The spring veggies in the trial beds have all gone to seed. Will be hauling them out, harvesting what I can, and sowing more seeds.

Other than pruning roses, what else is on the July agenda?

Remember the trial beds? I let them go in the heatwave as I knew that I wanted to plant them up with summer and fall veggies. Aren't they pretty?

I will be soaking the 'Organic Mix' bed a couple of times before sowing new seeds, as recommended by the supplier. While the spring cops did okay in this bed, they definitely did not produce anywhere near as well as the 'Grow Mix' bed so the supplier said to give it a couple of really thorough soakings and that should make a world of difference.

If these terms mean nothing to you, here is a short explanation... In spring, I built two new beds to trial a local suppliers two new soils. I am seeing how they fare and compare with each other and with my existing beds that hold their old soil recipe. In the spring season, one bed far surpassed the other in productivity. I am now planting it up for the summer to see how things go this season.

I will post those results later on this year. This is a very fun trial! I love to test out different products or methods to see which one works best for me and I try to always pass along the results of my different trails in my workshops and blog posts.

Tomatoes... While they were not loving the cool, grey weather we had just before the heatwave, they clearly loved the baking hot! They doubled in growth during that hot spell. The early slicers are fruiting, the rest are all flowering and just getting started making 'maters, the tomatoes in the greenhouse and hoophouse all have fruits on them but nothing ripe quite yet. Things are looking good, fingers crossed they stay that way!

Blossom End Rot - After that hot spell and the difficulties regulating watering, you might find BER on some of your upcoming tomatoes. Over-watering and under-watering can both lead to BER, especially in container plants where the roots cannot just go deeper for more water. During a heatwave it is very difficult to find a good balance.

What to do if you find BER? Remove the affected fruits and try to regulate your watering to an even schedule. I am currently deep watering every third day but you need to know your soil and how fast it dries out (not on the surface but down deep - remember, you planted your tomatoes deep for the extra deep root system).

Eggshells will not help once you already have it, bonemeal will not help, Epsom salts will not help. A liquid calcium might help if you do it while you water and regulate your watering schedule. I am not sure about the milk theory.

Garden lore says that if you scratch in some powdered milk and water it in, you will be getting calcium to the roots and it will help, or water it with a half milk/half water solution. I do not know that I believe this but it cannot hurt if you happen to have some on hand. Maybe do a trial if you have two tomatoes with BER, give one milk and one not. Let me know how you make out!

I think the tomatoes just adjust to the elements while we get a bit better about our watering schedule and ta-da, the tomato stops making yucky fruits, but I am a bit of a cynic, I admit. I would instead spray the tomatoes with a foliar feed of liquid seaweed or kelp a couple of times to help them better uptake nutrients from the soil. I really like Reindeer liquid seaweed, a local island product.

If you want to add calcium to the soil to help prevent BER, the best time is to add it at planting time, at the bottom of the hole to prevent it from happening in the first place (note for next year).

Garlic... I am harvesting every few days. I have 14 varieties that are all ready at different times, or at least different by a few days so that I can spread out the harvest so that I only have to deal with cleaning a couple dozen at a time. I have lifted 5 varieties thus far so 9 to go.

If you missed the garlic harvest post, you can see that here...

Weeding - a constant, even in the heat of summer. Purslane seems to be everywhere this year. Where on earth did it come from? It is out front in the rose beds, it is in the pathways, it is in the raised beds. Honest to goodness, seems to sprout new ones over night. Keep on picking! This stuff will quickly take over your beds and crowd out your seedlings. Apparently, it is edible and some find it yummy so if you like, check out how to eat it when you pull it from your gardens. I will not be joining you on that journey ; )

In summer, our soil tends to bake into concrete, the best time to weed so that you get roots and all, is after a rain or after you have watered the garden.

Squash blossoms that were pollinated are started to swell and grow...

Squash blossoms not pollinated will yellow, shrivel, and die.

Winter and Summer Squash - In the top picture you can see my spaghetti squash putting on loads of wee little squash… but in the bottom picture you can see two of them have yellowed and withered. This is normal. Nothing wrong with your plant or your soil, those blossoms just did not get pollinated.

Squash of all kinds, winter and summer, make both male and female blossoms, these blooms are only open for one day. You need both a male and a female to be open at the same time for pollination to occur and this can sometimes take a while. Once they do, the bees go from flower to flower to pollinate them. Some folks will hand pollinate the females in order to ensure pollination.

What can you do about it? Plant lots of squash. They do not have to be the same kind to pollinate each other… can be zucchini, pumpkins, pattypans, etc... ideally it is summer squash that pollinate summer squash, winter with winter, but do not stress it if not. As long as there is a male and a female flower blooming at the same time, you will get squash : )

Feeding - Anything growing in pots, planters, or baskets will need a feed this month.

Annual flowers need a weekly or bi-weekly feed in order to keep blooming as they will soon use up the nutrients in their pots/baskets. I use a general 15-30-15 or similar, something with a bigger middle number to keep the flowers blooming all summer long.

Roses, bay trees, citrus trees, olives, etc.. that stay in pots year round, will get a shovelful or two of manure as a top dressing to keep them happy and thriving. If you have a slow release fertiliser, this can be mixed in with the manure.

Peppers and tomatoes in pots get a tablespoon or two of Epsom salts on top of the pots. Tomatoes are fed with an organic tomato fertiliser every now and again, peppers only if they look peaked and need a boost.

In the garden - I do not usually feed anything the veggies in the garden as the soil is fed with compost and manure annually and sometimes we add organic feed to the planting hole. Everything should be performing nicely.

If your soil is not up to snuff yet, if it is new and you are just starting to build it up, you can either feed the plant or feed the soil once or twice a month. To feed the plant, use a liquid seaweed or manure tea to spray onto the foliage or water in with an organic vegetable food. To feed the soil, side dress between the rows and around the plants with really good compost or manure, they will get a slow feed each time you water.

Pest control - Your flowers should be all starting to flower and thrive now, attracting all sorts of beneficial insects to your garden.

If you were to sit in the garden and watch for a bit, I bet you will find ladybugs or other insects taking care of your pest problems. As I picked peas yesterday, I noticed a few green aphids crawling around the pathway. They must have been hiding in the vines. While I kept on picking, I saw a few ladybugs in the area, as well. During the short time that I was out there, they had already taken care of quite a few of those aphids. I just walked away and left them to their business.

Ideally, do not spray with anything, even organic safe sprays, if you do not have to. Wait it out a bit to see if nature does not help you out with that.

Find pockets in the garden to sow more seeds into for late summer, fall, and winter vegetables.

The garlic bed? - After harvesting your garlic, you have an entire bed sitting empty. If you use the same bed for your garlic again in the fall, you only have three months to go from seed to harvest. It cannot be greens and such as garlic beds are in a full sun location so is too hot for greens. I have tried different things throughout the years and find that bush beans, daikon radishes, turnips, kohlrabi, and cucumbers work the best. They thrive in the heat, grow quickly, are harvestable in late August and throughout September so that I can feed my bed with compost and plant next year’s garlic.

If you will not be using this same bed, if you are rotating your crops, this bed is fantastic for your fall, winter, and next spring veggies.

Spring veggie bed - If you have some brassicas, greens, lettuces, etc.. that are just about finished, harvest them before they bolt and use that space for planting.

Interplant - Sow seeds in rows between your summer crops. Carrots, spring onions, beets, turnips and other small root crops are great to toss in between your brassicas, your rows of lettuce, in the tomato bed…

What can you be planting/sowing right now?

Carrots - This week is your last week to toss in some more carrot seeds. It will be too late for them to size up if they are not in the ground before mid-month. I would not even leave it that long. The 7th to the 10th is usually my cut off date. Keep seeds moist until the germinate! Water once or twice daily, cover with burlap sacks to help hold in moisture till you see sprouting.

Potatoes - you can grow a late crop if you plant right now, ones that will be ready for Thanksgiving dinner. This is especially successful in grow bags or pots.

Harvesting potatoes... if your spuds have flowered, you can start to harvest a plant or two at a time for dinner. If you want storage potatoes, leave the rest in the ground till late summer when the vines have yellowed and died down. When this happens, they will have put on their thicker skins that makes them good for storage.

Brassicas - Start these now in pots or 6 packs or can be direct sown now if you can find the room. Here are some ideas of what you need to start soon in order to grow fall and winter crops. If you do not have the time or energy, the shops and market growers will have some for purchase in August.

Broccoli - for eating in fall
Sprouting broccoli - for eating in early spring
Cauliflower - for fall harvest
Cauliflower (Galleon ) to eat in spring.
Beets - for fall
Cabbage - overwintering kind ( Ballhead, Early Jersey Wakefield, Deadon…)
Daikon - grow for fall harvest or can be left in garden and harvested as needed
Kale
Kohlrabi - can be sown this month and harvested throughout the fall and winter
Lettuces and greens
Peas - sow these towards the end of the month for a fall harvest
Turnips - succession sow all summer and into early fall
Walla walla - start now to transplant next month and harvest next year in late spring