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Dig In: Garden checklist for week of Aug. 7

August starts with ‘normal’ temperatures and opportunities to get things done

4 red zinnias
Zinnias brighten any landscape, and entice pollinators, too. (Photo: Kathy Morrison)

After so many triple-digit days in July, the start of August actually feels on the cool side.

According to the National Weather Service, Sacramento will see a steady string of afternoons in the low 90s with overnight lows dipping down close to 60. Historically, that’s normal; average temperatures for Sacramento in August: High of 91 degrees and low of 58.

This mild summer weather is great for plants – and for getting things done. Tackle chores and watering in the morning before temperatures edge up in the afternoon. Remember: Always water before fertilizing.

* Pick up after your fruit trees. Clean up debris and dropped fruit; this cuts down on insects and prevents the spread of brown rot.

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

* Feed other fruit trees, too, with slow-release fertilizer for better production for next year.

* Camellia leaves looking a little yellow? Feed them some chelated iron. That goes for azaleas and gardenias, too.

* To prolong bloom into fall, feed begonias, fuchsias, annuals and container plants.

* Fertilize fall-blooming perennials, too. Chrysanthemums can be fed until the buds start to open.

* 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.

* Give tomatoes and peppers a boost with phosphate-rich fertilizer to help fruiting.

* 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.

* In the vegetable garden, direct seed beets, carrots, leaf lettuce and turnips.

* Plant potatoes.

* Pinch off dead flowers from perennials and annuals to lengthen their summer bloom.

* Deadhead roses for more flowers in early fall.

* 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.



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Garden Checklist for week of May 18

Get outside early in the morning while temperatures are still cool – and get to work!

* Plant, plant, plant! It’s prime planting season in the Sacramento area. Time to set out those tomato transplants along with peppers and eggplants. Pinch off any flowers on new transplants to make them concentrate on establishing roots instead of setting premature fruit.

* Direct-seed melons, cucumbers, summer squash, corn, radishes, pumpkins and annual herbs such as basil.

* Harvest cabbage, lettuce, peas and green onions.

* In the flower garden, direct-seed sunflowers, cosmos, salvia, zinnias, marigolds, celosia and asters. Transplant seedlings for many of the same flowers.

* Plant dahlia tubers.

* Transplant petunias, marigolds and perennial flowers such as astilbe, columbine, coneflowers, coreopsis, dahlias, rudbeckia and verbena.

* Keep an eye out for slugs, snails, earwigs and aphids that want to dine on tender new growth.

* Feed summer bloomers with a balanced fertilizer.

* For continued bloom, cut off spent flowers on roses as well as other flowering plants.

* Are birds picking your fruit off trees before it’s ripe? Try hanging strips of aluminum foil on tree branches. The shiny, dangling strips help deter birds from making themselves at home.

* As spring-flowering shrubs finish blooming, give them a little pruning to shape them, removing old and dead wood. Lightly trim azaleas, fuchsias and marguerites for bushier plants.

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