Asparagus

Did you know that you can plant asparagus one time and harvest it for fifteen years?  Actually, different websites suggest ten to twenty years.  Now that is my kind of plant!  I may have mentioned in an earlier post that our garden was going to be home to some asparagus this year.  Seeing as how this was a new venture, I chose to dedicate one of our 4' x 8' raised beds to the cause.  I purchased one year old crowns (the recommended method) from a local nursery, looked up planting tips and stuck them in the ground way back in late winter.  It took a little while, but each crown sprouted an average of three shoots.  Yeah!  Continuing my reading on the subject, it became apparent that harvesting should not be done until the third year.  That means patience.  If it means I get to harvest this nutritious vegetable for the next fifteen years or so, I can be patient.  Allowing the spears to continue to grow, you'll notice that they will soon look like a type of fern.   We all know that this year has been very hot and dry so far.  I have watered very little, but the ferns still look good.  One website suggested that the plant prefers conditions a little too dry as opposed to a little too wet, but it was also noted that if they become too hot and kept without water too long, the yield the following year will be smaller and less healthy.  That means that I need to get the hose out and do a better job.   I am keeping my fingers crossed that next year's spears will look even better and that before long my family and I can enjoy the fruits of our labor for many years.

Here are a few of my favorite websites on the subject, but there are many more out there:

http://easttexasgardening.tamu.edu/tips/veggie/asparagus.html

http://aggie-horticulture.tamu.edu/archives/parsons/vegetables/asparagu.html

http://www.ehow.com/how_6186997_plant-texas-asparagus.html

I hope this information was helpful to anyone trying to decide what to plant next year.  As always, happy gardening!

Eeep!  Squash bugs on my summer squash!  Gross!  Diatomaceous earth applied around base of plant, squash bugs and nymphs squashed, eggs scraped off (disgusting), and plant prayed over.  We'll have to keep an eye on this guy for a while.

Planting in Summer

I'm sure you've read in a million places that the best time to plant is in spring and fall.  That is pretty much true.  The reality of it though is that summer is often a time when many of us are tempted to indulge in all the pretty flowers and vegetables that we see in the stores.  Quite a few of them are on clearance too, a further temptation.  The good news is that there IS a way to get these last minute finds to live well and prosper.
I for one am no exception to the case.  I've spent the last month and a half redoing an entire garden bed, and my husband has yet to meet a pepper plant that he doesn't feel compelled to bring home.  While I'm no master gardener, I have some experience with this one now.  I believe that the key with summer plantings here in Texoma unsurprisingly is water.
What we need to remember here is that summers in Texoma run hot, real hot.  The temperatures have been up around 100 degrees every day for weeks now.  Most of Texoma is prairie land, so the afternoon sun burns down on our garden beds often with very little tree cover to shade it.  Finally the winds in early summer scour the moisture right out of the first inch or so of the soil in our garden beds.  Trouble is that's exactly where the roots of our newly planted darlings live.  They haven't had the months of spring to dig in and branch out.  The constant drying and scouring out of the first layer of topsoil can be a death sentence.  Even if you're watering every other day, the summer babies can bite it.
Keeping my new plants alive has required frequent watering to keep that topmost layer of soil  moist.  For me this has meant two waterings a day while it's so hot, once in the morning and again in the afternoon.    This is especially true for the many plants we have in pots, but only slightly less true for the things that we've stuck in the ground.  My husband and I work together to ensure that nothing dries out.  This has been the only way that we've been able to keep late plantings from dying off.  Once they've shown that they have established good roots, usually with a flush of new growth, we can ease off a bit.

Caveat One:  Don't bother with plants that aren't made for the summer sun.  Pansies for example will burn up on you out here, regardless of how much you soak them.  Begonias have no business in any of my gardens, where I can't offer them any shade.

Caveat Two:  Take care with all of this not to overwater your established plants.  I have a series of pots near the front door, a couple of which contain very established pentas and sedum.  I noticed that the once happy pots were looking a bit depressed, and realized that I was accidentally overwatering them along with their summer planted buddies.  Avoiding that pot is bringing them back to uprightedness.

Arghhh!  These dang grasshoppers got the last of my bok choy!  Little buggers.

My Basil is Bolting!

My basil is on the run!  Well alright, it's not really running all over the place, but it IS bolting.  What's bolting?  That's when a plant, usually due to hot weather, thinks the world is ending and abandons all leaf growth in favor of producing flowers and seed.  I've seen this with all kinds of flowers, vegetables and herbs.  For many it's the vegetables and herbs that are the most frustrating, because if you're growing either of those two, it's not usually the darn flowers or seeds that you're after.  Also, once a plant bolts, its disregard for leaf growth and maintenance can often lead to dying, woody, or bitter tasting harvest.
You can sometimes halt this process if you catch the bolt in its early stages.  Clip off the flowers and any buds that you see.  I've been known to also clip that robust main stem they're growing off of down closer to the rest of the "bushy" part.  With herbs this can often stop it bolting, and it returns to normal leaf growth.  With vegetables it's very hit or miss.  Often all you're doing is buying yourself a little time to harvest what you can before the taste is ruined. 
While bolting in my experience is usually brought on by hot weather, make sure that you're giving your garden enough water.  You don't want vegetable and herb beds to run wet and dry.  Consistent watering may help to keep the soil temperature from ranging too high. 
As for my basil, I've snipped it back as described above, and will keep my fingers crossed that it quits its shenanigans and goes back to growing leaves for me.

Happy gardening!

If You Can't Take the Heat, Get Outta My Front Yard!

I just spent the morning and early afternoon weeding and then planting in about 10 lantana bushes into the large flower bed in the front of the house.  And also one leftover lamb's ear, but he didn't take long.  I am beat!
The flower bed along the front walk and the large rectangular flower bed that it leads to has been a west-facing work in progress ever since I moved into this house.  It would take more fingers and toes than I own to count the number of plants that I've lost to the aggressive, drying afternoon sun that the front of the house endures. Even happy marigolds and petunias burn up!
Over the years I've been learning which are the performers to trust on the west side of the house.  These guys have been consistent sun-loving performers who can take the heat.  So far these are:  roses (need water), lamb's ear, moss rose (portulacas), yellow lavendar, butterfly bush, russian sage, morning glory (yeah you heard me, but it NEEDS WATER), and now, hopefully, lantana and salvia. 
Barb and Dave over at Sweetwater Farm Greenhouse have been helping me figure out this difficult area.  The lamb's ear was their idea, and it might be the most successful one yet.  Lamb's ear needs very little to perform big.  It doesn't care about the heat, and, as long as you give it water, will spread like wildfire.  I love the soft, fuzzy leaves.
Since that turned out to be such a great recommendation, I didn't hesitate to try out their latest:  lantana and salvia.  I knew salvia to be a very xeric plant, but the burning heat could be another story.  I planted two a couple weeks ago.  The jury is still out on them.  The lantana, usually an annual, I just got into the ground today.  I've always loved the color and performance of lantana.  I'll report back on how it fares in my death trap of a flower bed.
In the meantime though, it's straight to the pool with me!  Hoo!  That's enough work for one day.

Quick Tips: Planting Store Bought Tomato Plants

So your tomato seedlings failed.  Maybe they got too leggy and laid over in the wind or burned to a crisp in the Texoma sun.  I'm very sorry.  It's so disappointing when you lose new plants, especially if they were of a specialty type.

But not to worry!  These things happen.  You can still have tomatoes in your garden.  Head on over to your local nursery or home repair warehouse, and pick you a few tomato plants.  Yes, I know it's late in the season, but the stores still have them.  Once you get them home, you'll need to get them into the ground quickly, so they can root in and get to growing.  Here are a few quick tips on that:



1.  Use the good soil.  Do not plant these guys in our black gumbo, or even the sandier soil that we find in Texoma.  The gumbo is a super sticky root choker, and the sandy loam is like concrete when it's dry.  I'd recommend a raised bed, especially if you're in a black gumbo area like me.  If you've got sandy loam, then you can mix some of that into your garden soil, but go easy.  Remember:  concrete.  I personally use compost mixed with a little sandy loam.  You can outsource these from places like Texas Pure Products or buy them by the bag in stores.  You want uncompacted, well-draining, nutrient rich soil for hungry tomatoes.  You can also grow tomatoes in a pot.  Just make sure the pot is big enough to fit plant and cage, and be aware that it may require more watering than a garden bed.   

2.  Bury those babies.  You want a good root system working for your plants, so go ahead and bury them until just a few of the topmost stems are out of the soil.  That means planting some of the green main stem in the soil.  Do it.  That buried stem will convert to root, and give your plant a good root system to feed lots of lovely tomatoes growing up top.  This will also ensure that the strong winds that come up on us suddenly don't snap your newly planted babies in half.  You probably know this already, but break off the bottom of those compostable cups before you plant. 



3.  Stake them early.  Tomatoes are a pain to get into a cage after they're grown out, so do yourself a favor, and cage them while they're small.  And do cage them, please.  You'll have less stem breakage once they're heavy with fruit if you take this step.  I once lost a whole 4 foot long branch worth of tomatoes from not caging a plant properly.  It split off in the wind before the blossoms (loads of blossoms) could fruit.  Never made that mistake again.



4.  Mulch.  That's right.  Get some mulch around the plants.  I know that seems weird to do in a vegetable bed.  We're accustomed to mulching flower beds, but tomato beds?  Sure!  Mulch serves several purposes, including keeping weeds down (spurgeweed and johnson grass, anyone?), holding moisture better in the soil underneath, and slowly providing nutrients to the soil as it composts in. 

5.  Water like crazy.  Last but not least, give them lots of water.  I've never known tomatoes to mind the heat much, but they need lots of water to do their thing.  Don't make mud of their soil bed, but don't let these guys run dry either.   



One of my tomato beds.  The PVC & mesh keep the cats out.

And those are the quick tips.  Feel free to send us a message if you need more detailed info, or are having a problem not covered by the above.  Happy gardening!