Hot August days and nights will stress gardens and gardeners
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Harvest peppers to keep the plants producing. These Gypsy
peppers grow at the Fair Oaks Horticulture Center. Notice the
thick straw mulch that conserves soil moisture. (Photo:
Kathy Morrison)
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The heat is back on! According to the National Weather Service, expect a string of triple-digit days, perhaps starting as soon as Sunday.
After a warm weekend, Sacramento’s forecast calls for 100 degrees-plus every day through at least Friday, peaking at 104 degrees on Tuesday. Overnight lows are warm, too, staying above 67 degrees.
Average for this week of August in Sacramento: High of 94 and low of 61.
Such heat is sure to stress plants -- and gardeners, too.
The good news? As hot as it will feel, we shouldn’t be flirting with any records. The hottest August day in Sacramento history: 112 degrees (set Aug. 16, 2020).
Get your chores done before 10 a.m. while the morning is still relatively cool. Water early and deeply. Remember to stay hydrated, too.
* 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.
* Squash and cucumbers refusing to set fruit? Help the pollinators, who tend not to come out in hot weather. Take a small paint brush, dip it into the center of a flower, twist slightly to gather pollen, then dip that pollen-covered brush into other flowers on the plant.
* 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.
* Mulch can be your garden's best friend; it conserves moisture while blocking out weeds. But don't let mulch mound around stalks, stems or trunks. That can promote rot.
* Pinch off dead flowers from perennials and annuals to lengthen their summer bloom.
* Deadhead roses. They’ll be back in bloom in six weeks.
* Pick up after your fruit trees. Clean up debris and dropped fruit; this cuts down on insects and prevents the spread of brown rot.
* 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, carrots, leaf lettuce and turnips.
* Plant potatoes.
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Food in My Back Yard Series
April 15: Grow culinary herbs in containers
April 8: When to plant summer vegetables
April 1: Don't be fooled by these garden myths
March 25: Fertilizer tips: How to 'feed' your vegetables for healthy growth
March 18: Time to give vegetable seedlings some more space
March 11: Ways to win the fight against weeds
March 4: Potatoes from the garden
Feb. 25: Plant a fruit tree now -- for later
Feb. 18: How to squeeze more food into less space
Feb. 11: When to plant? Consider staggering your transplants
Feb. 4: Starting in seed starting
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Garden Checklist for week of April 13
Enjoy this spring weather – and get to work! Your garden needs you!
* Start setting out tomato, pepper and eggplant transplants.
* From seed, plant beans, beets, cantaloupes, carrots, corn, cucumbers, melons, radishes, and winter and summer squash.
* Plant onion sets.
* In the flower garden, plant seeds for asters, cosmos, celosia, marigolds, salvia, sunflowers and zinnias.
* Transplant petunias, zinnias, geraniums and other summer bloomers.
* Plant perennials and dahlia tubers for summer bloom.
* Plant summer bulbs, such as gladiolus and tuberous begonias.
* Smell orange blossoms? Feed citrus trees with a low dose of balanced fertilizer (such as 10-10-10) during bloom to help set fruit. Keep an eye out for ants.
* Apply slow-release fertilizer to the lawn.
* Thoroughly clean debris from the bottom of outdoor ponds or fountains.
* Trim dead flowers but not leaves from spring-flowering bulbs such as daffodils and tulips. Those leaves gather energy to create next year's flowers. Also, give the bulbs a fertilizer boost after bloom.
* Weed, weed, weed! Don’t let unwanted plants go to seed.