August In The Potager - Notes From The Potting Shed
- Aug 14, 2024
- 7 min read
So much has changed in just a few short weeks. Let me fill you in!
To start with... Beware, this is the month of powdery mildew. With the warm days and cool nights, the dew point rises. Pumpkins, cucumbers, and squash start to get a white powdery coating on the leaves.
Water in the mornings or late afternoon to make sure the ground is dry as you go into nighttime cooler temps.
Water at ground level only, try not to get the foliage wet. This is when weeping hoses or drip systems come in handy as they are underneath those big leaves.
Don't waste your time/money spraying with milk or baking soda. It will not be effective this time of year, and does not work well on these hairy leaves.
Snip off leaves early in the season to help slow down the spread. And yes, it will spread. It also helps to get better air flow around the plant.
When your cukes are more yucky leaves than good leaves, pull out the plant, but leave your pumpkins and squash till the fruits are ripe. The p/m will not hurt the fruits.
Relax. It is normal. Happens every year at this time.
The Back Yard
A few days ago, we decided to move our raised beds from the backyard to the side, and make the back corner into a layered shrub and flower bed. An ode to the cohousing gardens, of sorts.
This is what it looked like just a few days ago. We literally lifted up the wooden beds and moved them over to the side yard, a better growing zone for my garlic, potatoes, onions, and flowers. Will show you that part of the yard after the landscaper has finished up.
These potatoes were harvested early (going to be the potato salad for our family gathering tomorrow), the flowers were moved to other beds throughout the yard, the peas harvested and vines composted. This whole thing from start to finish, from the talking about it, to finishing, took less than a week. Whew!
This is it just after we mulched it up last night. Hubby just finished, as you can tell from the dirt on the patio, but I could not wait to show you the new space. Now for the plants to fill in this space - in 3 to 5 years, hah! There are roses, hydrangeas, spirea, dwarf lilacs, penstemon, balloon flowers, salvia, veronica, heuchera, and lots of echinacea.
In The Potager
What a change in weather we have had... and the plants are loving it. We went from smoking hot to downright cool, and got an inch and a half of rain to boot.
Most plants loved this change, some plants did not...
Lettuce - loves cooler temps, but most all of it had bolted during the heat wave. I had three patches, all been started at different times, so we have had lettuce every day... till now.
I now have a short window with no lettuce to harvest, but the two rows that I sowed last week are already up and well on their way. The rain and cooler temps really helped them germinate quickly. We'll be eating lettuce from the garden in no time once again.
The tomatoes - like hot and sunny, but are sighing with relief with this weather change. The cooler temp is helping them slowly begin to ripen in the garden and greenhouse, finally! They are looking pretty great, all in all. I was worried with that late start, but all seems to be going well.
The broccolini - started flowering in the heat, but I just snapped off those stalks and left the plants. They will soon make new sprouts, will keep on going till frost takes them down. Pss, the flowers are edible, yummy, and look great in a salad.
Sadly, my celeries - bolted. It appears that they can handle heatwaves just fine, and heat domes, too. Cool weather is fine, wet weather is fine, and winters on the island are fine. Turns out what is not fine is abrupt weather change. As our night time lows went down to single digits after being in the high 30's, the celery thought that time was up, winter is here, and went to seed. While they are still usable for soups, can be frozen or dehydrated, they are not great for fresh eating. Luckily, I have some in the greenhouse that is still fine!
In the Greenhouse
The peppers and eggplants are overrun with aphids. I bought a bag of ladybugs last week to help clean things up organically. No spraying in there as that might kill off my bees and pollinators, which I need o too. I gave the plants a light spray of water in the evening, as per directions, and placed the ladybugs here and there in the raised bed, right on top of the aphid covered leaves. I then shut the door and left them in there for 2 days before opening the door again.
The hope is that they'll have laid eggs before they flew away, so their larvae eat up the rest of the aphids. The parents did a decent job, but I am still inundated. I am starting to despair.
In the left side raised bed, everything is doing so well. Tomatoes are ripening, cucumbers are flowering and fruiting, and my melons are doing so well. They are my babies. I go in there every couple of days to help pollinate all the females, just in case the bees did not do their job. Thus far, I have about a dozen melon babies hiding in that jungle.
These are round, small watermelons (Mini-Love and Ice Box Doll Babies) great for shorter summer areas like mine.
To make sure your melons are being pollinated, you can hand pollinate.
The female blossoms have a baby melon underneath the flower. Leave those flowers attached to the vine.
The male flowers have just a slender stem. Pinch off one of the open male flowers and (ahem) rub the centers of the two flowers together. That's it, job well done. I usually take a new male for each female as they tend to make more males than females, but you can just use the one.
I have started topping the indeterminate tomatoes in the greenhouse. This puts the energy back into the fruits and flowers that are already on the vine. You may have to do it several times, especially if you have allowed some of the suckers to grow.
We have been eating tomatoes from the dwarf potted plants, but only a few from the greenhouse and garden. Most are still green, so they have about 4 weeks till possible first frost to finish up. Yikes! The greenhouse ones will be fine for longer, of course.
My baskets are kind of ho hum this year, but the planter pots are fairly nice. It is not the year that I hoped it would be. The petunias are not my faves, will not do those again (I bought the pink bubblegum waves). Anyway, things look nice, despite the fence.
The landscaper has begun working in the side yard, the backyard will be done last.
That fence is temporary snow fencing. Will be used to keep the dog off of the new sod, once that has been laid. I actually kind of like the look of it, hahaha, but we want to leave the middle of our pie shaped lot free for Berkeley to do her zoomies, so it will go once winter sets in.
Q&A's
Q- This year, I have lots of male flowers, but few females on my squash and pumpkins. Is there a reason for this?
Tanja - This is a very common issue as it takes more energy for the plant to make females.
They often produce males first, for the first few weeks. This may just be a maturity issue as it takes more energy to make females.
Weather can make a difference. Too cool (or hot) and the plant does not have enough energy to put into making females.
Having more males than females gives you optimum chances for pollination to occur. If you have more females than males, you may not get much fruit production.
Lack of nutrients to make female flowers. You may have poor soil, or too much nitrogen so that you have healthy foliage but few flowers. Feed with liquid seaweed or kelp for an organic boost.
Stress from lack of water, too much water, too much sunshine/heat, or bugs can all cause your plant to make more males.
Q - the tomatoes in my greenhouse are not producing as much as they usually do. Is this a lack of pollinators?
Tanja - Yes, it may well be. Luckily, tomatoes are self fertile so you just need to give the vine, or the cage, a good shake. That will move the pollen about, imitates the action of bees. For more ideas to help your tomatoes produce more, better, bigger tomatoes, see here.
Q - My tumbler tomato has stopped growing, the new flowers have shrivelled up, does not have bugs... is it a bust?
Tanja - Determinate tomatoes have a determined life span, so it sounds like it is just finished for the year. It has reached the height it is going to get to, will not grow or produce more flowers or fruits.
Q - I am putting in some posts with lights, somewhat like you did not the acreage (see photo above). I keep seeing that I need to sink the posts 1/3 of the way into the ground. That seems like a long way to sink a 7 foot post. Can you please ask hubby how far down he sank yours?
Tanja - Our posts went 3 feet down and were cemented in so that they would not lean, tilt, or twist. To get that same look, I would get a 10 to 12 foot post, depending on how high you want the lights to go. Alternately, you could put in a charming split cedar fence, or similar, and hang the light on that instead. Still have to go deep but posts do not need to be as tall. We had considered that option, would still be a cute look.
Q - Do the seeded paper and seeded gift tags work with all flowers? Could I try it with zinnias?
Tanja - Many of the easy to direct sow annuals can be used in the seeded paper. I used both cosmos and alyssum, both worked super well. Zinnias and calendula would also be great options.
Our sweet Hemingway crossed the rainbow bridge last week. He is very missed, by us and by Berkeley. He was the sweetest marshmallow of a boy.
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