With much of the country in the midst of a heat wave, many gardeners are trying to figure out how best to help their gardens cope with the extreme temperatures. Heat stress is a very real problem, both for people and for plants.
There are several things you can do in your garden to keep it healthy and productive. Keep in mind that no matter what you do, vegetable production for crops like tomatoes will slow a bit until temperatures cool down. Lettuces and other salad greens will bolt after a couple of days of high temps. Fruit and blossom drop is common, as is leaf scorch from too much hot sun. You can't avoid these particular problems, but you can make sure that your plants come through the heat with their health intact, ready to start producing again once it cools down.
As far as heat stress and the gardener: try to work in the garden in the morning, before it gets too hot out. Drink plenty of water. And please (please!) stop gardening if you feel light-headed or dizzy. Gardening is fun, and things need to be done, but sometimes sitting down in the shade of your trees is the very best way to spend time in your garden.
Here's hoping you (and your garden) stay cool this week!
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It’s been very hot in WV this summer also. My strawberry plant looks good, but the berries are very small. I am thinking it’s due to the heat. My tomato plant is pretty happy, the area shades over around 2pm. The radishes were a no show…probably planted too late, I’ll try for a fall harvest.
Thanks for the info. It is truly hot this summer – I really appreciate the tips, so I can keep my garden a bit cooler this hot summer.
Right now we are in Preston County, WV. We have been here for about a month and a wk. It is very warm here but the garden and plants seem to be doing real good. I try to water a little early in the morning. We have had plenty of kale, collards, lettuce, cucumbers, tomatoes, bell peppers, cabbage and squash. Also, potatoes that I grew in buckets. I started some of the things in a hot box around April 1st. I forgot to mention we had broccoli too. Each day we prepare our meals from what we find in the garden. There is no better eating than that. Also, we have canned and froze Kale twice and the beauty is we didn’t even plant it this year. It just came up from 4yrs. ago. The Lord is so good
The hot weather is really affecting the final stages of ripening on our tomatoes, the peppers, however, are lovin it. I’ve frozen about 24 quarts and several gallons of a variety of peppers so far. Passing the “hot” ones to a neighbor who loves them. Squash and cukes are doing well and are producing if slowly. Radishes are doing well, both for eating and as a trap crop. Fighting another wave of stink bugs, yucky little critters. Been picking them off and drowning them, until the heat got too much for me. So went to pyrethrin spray, they seem to have a “taste” for insecticidal soap, LOL. That seems to have gotten things under control. Getting ready to start seedlings of broccoli, cauliflower and cabbage. We get much better results waiting until fall to plant cole crops here in VA. Normally, I can get fresh broccoli thru Feb, if we cover the plants when a killing frost is predicted. And they are sooo good. Happy gardening, y’all.
doc