End of June Gardening and Weather Report

As I have said before, the weather has made gardening very difficult this year. May and June are usually mild months, with highs in the 60s and 70s, and we usually get a good deal of rain as well. This year we got very little rain in those two months, and the temperatures were much warmer than usual, with a few very chilly days mixed in. With such a rollercoaster of temperatures, my little plant starts have been in a state of shock and confusion.

I originally planted six plants each of zucchini, yellow summer squash, Red Kuri squash, and Sweet Mama squash. Due to a poor experiment (about which I posted earlier), of those 24 little seedlings only four of the Sweet Mamas survived. Those are visible at the bottom of the above photo.

Once I realized so many were dying I direct-seeded the yellow summer squash and the Red Kuri, since I had extra seeds. When the seeds didn't come up, I went to the Farmers Market and purchased two Red Kuri plants and two yellow summer squash plants. I purchased two zucchini plants from a neighbor.

Even though I thoroughly stirred up the dirt to plant the new, bigger starts, three yellow summer squash seeds eventually managed to sprout! It will be interesting to see if those plants every get big enough to produce squash after getting such a late start.

Most of those purchased starts are struggling, however. Their first few days in the ground were mild weather days, but then it got hot again. I have to keep newspaper tents over them or else they get limp and wilt-y every afternoon. The forecast is for plenty of 80s and 90s, and I wonder whether those plants will ever become strong enough to bear the afternoon heat.

My cucumber starts fared no better than my squash starts. Of six pickling cucumber seedlings, three have survived. I direct seeded, then gave up and planted 2 purchased plants. Now three of those seeds have decided to sprout after all.

Of the six slicing cucumber starts, one survived. I purchased two more. All the purchased cucumber starts continue to struggle in the heat, two weeks after being planted.

In case you are wondering, the blocks of wood scattered around on the weed barrier are covering slits that I am not using this year. I am less likely to trip over the pieces of wood than to catch my toe on a flap of landscape cloth and fall.

In this photo you can see that most of the garden is finally starting to grow. I have a row of flowers in the foreground: zinnias, cosmos, and gladiolus. Behind them is a row of peppers, basil, and broccoli. I have tucked marigolds all over. The next row of tall plants is tomatoes, and farther back you can see the corn and the green beans, with the potatoes 'way in the back.

The five expensive mail-order onion starts are growing very nicely.

The other onions are alive, but still very small. Alive is good! A friend told me her onions stayed tiny last year, so she just left them in the ground all winter and this summer they are growing into huge onions. I may have to try that!

The green beans are about to blossom!

The peas are beginning to climb up the fence.

The blueberry bushes have quite a few berries on them this year.

Oddly enough, something has nibbled off all the dill plants. I can't imagine what insect or wildlife would decide to eat that. Grasshoppers? Ground squirrels? Pocket gophers? Birds? Who knows? We have fence to keep the deer and the wild turkeys out of the garden, and sonic repellers that tend to keep the rodents away, but insects and birds can't very well be stopped.

It will be July by the time this is actually posted, but it is still a June progress report. Stay tuned for the next update!

All photos taken on my Android phone.