Red-hot start could make July challenging
A two-tone zinnia catches the early morning light. There's still time to plant zinnias and other flowers for summer color, but wait until it cools off a bit later in the week. Kathy Morrison
Stay hydrated. That advice applies both to plants and people as we’re on high heat alert through Sunday night.
According to the National Weather Service, Sacramento is in the midst of its first triple-digit heat wave of 2023. Downtown hit 104 degrees Friday and 107 is forecast Saturday. Some Sacramento area communities could see 110 degrees.
Last Sunday (June 25), Sacramento’s high was only 76 degrees. That’s a 30-degree jump.
June saved its hottest day for last. “At 1:30 p.m. today, downtown Sac hit 100ºF!! First time this year!” tweeted the NWS Sacramento office on Friday afternoon. “We just ended a 293-day streak of below 100 temps. This is the 2nd longest streak since 2000. HOT DOG!”
Fortunately, these triple-digit days won’t last. By Tuesday’s Fourth of July holiday, Sacramento’s forecast high is 94 degrees. Normal for July: 92.
Take advantage of cooler temperatures in the early morning to get things done. (Or wait until next weekend if possible.)
* Keep your vegetable garden watered, mulched and weeded. Water before 8 a.m. to reduce the chance of fungal infection and to conserve moisture.
* Don’t fertilize during a heat wave; wait a week before feeding hungry veggies.
* Don’t let tomatoes wilt or dry out completely. Give tomatoes a deep watering two to three times a week.
* Avoid blossom end rot by keeping fast-developing vegetables evenly watered.
* Harvest vegetables promptly to encourage plants to produce more. Squash especially tends to grow rapidly in hot weather. Keep an eye on zucchini.
* Expect a gap in tomato production; pollen tends to dry out when temperatures hit 95 degrees and fewer tomatoes will set.
* If your melons and squash aren't setting fruit, give the bees a hand. With a small, soft paintbrush, gather some pollen from male flowers, then brush it inside the female flowers, which have a tiny swelling at the base of their petals. (That's the embryo melon or squash.) Within days, that little swelling should start growing.
* Pinch back chrysanthemums for bushy plants and more flowers in September.
* Remove spent flowers from roses, daylilies and other bloomers as they finish flowering.
* Pinch off blooms from basil so the plant will grow more leaves.
* Later in the week, plant petunias, snapdragons, zinnias and marigolds for instant summer color.
* From seed, plant corn, pumpkins, radishes, winter squash and sunflowers. Keep seedlings evenly moist.
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Garden Checklist for week of Jan. 12
Once the winds die down, it’s good winter gardening weather with plenty to do:
* Prune, prune, prune. Now is the time to cut back most deciduous trees and shrubs. The exceptions are spring-flowering shrubs such as lilacs.
* Now is the time to prune fruit trees. (The exceptions are apricot and cherry trees, which are susceptible to a fungus that causes dieback. Save them until summer.) Clean up leaves and debris around the trees to prevent the spread of disease.
* Prune roses, even if they’re still trying to bloom. Strip off any remaining leaves, so the bush will be able to put out new growth in early spring.
* Clean up leaves and debris around your newly pruned roses and shrubs. Put down fresh mulch or bark to keep roots cozy.
* After the wind stops, apply horticultural oil to fruit trees to control scale, mites and aphids. Oils need 24 hours of dry weather after application to be effective.
* This is also the time to spray a copper-based fungicide to peach and nectarine trees to fight leaf curl. (The safest effective fungicides available for backyard trees are copper soap -- aka copper octanoate -- or copper ammonium, a fixed copper fungicide. Apply either of these copper products with 1% horticultural oil to increase effectiveness.)
* When forced bulbs sprout, move them to a cool, bright window. Give them a quarter turn each day so the stems will grow straight.
* Browse through seed catalogs and start making plans for spring and summer.
* Divide daylilies, Shasta daisies and other perennials.
* Cut back and divide chrysanthemums.
* Plant bare-root roses, trees and shrubs.
* Transplant pansies, violas, calendulas, English daisies, snapdragons and fairy primroses.
* In the vegetable garden, plant fava beans, head lettuce, mustard, onion sets, radicchio and radishes.
* Plant bare-root asparagus and root divisions of rhubarb.
* In the bulb department, plant callas, anemones, ranunculus and gladioli for bloom from late spring into summer.
* Plant blooming azaleas, camellias and rhododendrons. If you’re shopping for these beautiful landscape plants, you can now find them in full flower at local nurseries.
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