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Dig In: Garden Checklist for week of Aug. 4


Give your developing citrus a last round of fertilizer. (Photo by Kathy Morrison)

After triple-digit weekend, make most of cool-down



Early August weather can feel like someone’s playing with the thermostat: Blazing hot one day, then suddenly 10 degrees cooler the next.

This week illustrates that pattern with triple-digit temperatures predicted for this weekend, before dipping back into the 80s by Thursday.

What’s average for August in Sacramento? According to the National Weather Service, it’s “only” 91 degrees for highs and 58 for overnight lows.

Here’s what should be on your August to-do list:

* Prepare for a fall full of flowers by paying a little extra attention to your garden. Cut off spent blooms from roses, annuals and perennials, then give them a boost of fertilizer. Make sure to water plants deeply before feeding. Roses will rebloom about six to eight weeks after deadheading.

* Harvest tomatoes, beans, squash, pepper and eggplants to prompt plants to keep producing. Give your plants a deep watering twice a week, more if planted in containers. After irrigating, give them a boost with phosphate-rich fertilizer to help plants set fruit.

* Watch out for caterpillars and hornworms in the vegetable garden. They can strip a plant bare in one day. Pick them off plants by hand in early morning or late afternoon.

* Feed citrus trees their last round of fertilizer for the year. This will give a boost to the fruit that's now forming.

* Indoors, start seedlings for fall vegetable planting, including bunching onion, cabbage, broccoli, cauliflower, kale, radicchio and lettuce.

* Sow seeds of perennials in pots for fall planting including yarrow, coneflower and salvia.

* In the garden, direct seed beets, bush beans, carrots, leaf lettuce and turnips. Plant potatoes.

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Garden Checklist for week of June 22

Mornings this first week of summer will remain comfortably cool – just right for gardening!

* Water early in the morning to cut down on evaporation. Check soil moisture and deep water trees and shrubs. Keep new transplants and veggies evenly moist. Deep water tomatoes to encourage deep roots.

* From seed, plant corn, melons, pumpkins, radishes, squash and sunflowers.

* Plant basil to go with your tomatoes.

* Transplant summer annuals such as petunias, marigolds and zinnias. It’s also a good time to transplant perennial flowers including astilbe, columbine, coneflowers, coreopsis, dahlias, rudbeckia, salvia and verbena.

* Tie up vines and stake tall plants such as gladiolus and lilies. That gives their heavy flowers some support.

* Dig and divide crowded bulbs after the tops have died down.

* Feed summer flowers with a slow-release fertilizer.

* Mulch, mulch, mulch! This “blanket” keeps moisture in the soil longer and helps your plants cope during hot weather.

* Avoid pot “hot feet.” Place a 1-inch-thick board under container plants sitting on pavement. This little cushion helps insulate them from radiated heat.

* Thin grapes on the vine for bigger, better clusters later this summer.

* Cut back fruit-bearing canes on berries.

* Feed camellias, azaleas and other acid-loving plants. Mulch to conserve moisture and reduce heat stress.

* Cut back Shasta daisies after flowering to encourage a second bloom in the fall.

* Trim off dead flowers from rose bushes to keep them blooming through the summer. Roses also benefit from deep watering and feeding now. A top dressing of aged compost will keep them happy. It feeds as well as keeps roots moist.

* Pinch back chrysanthemums for bushier plants with many more flowers in September.

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