The garden is growing so fast these days, if you leave for a few days it is impressive how much has grown when you return. In spite of disease problems with the late rains, it looks like it is a fantastic fruit year,  Every where I have gone lately I see plums dropping and peach trees full. Mid July is the time to gear up for harvesting, checking zucchini on a daily basis, and changing the way you eat so the abundance from the garden dictates the menu. 

The crazy thing about this next month is that just as you are fully in the summer harvest you have to start thinking about the fall garden.  After years of not very large broccoli and cabbage, and miniature carrots in November, I finally realized I needed to start the fall garden sooner.  If you start plants from seed in containers inside, in the dappled shade of a tree, or in a greenhouse, start cabbage, Brussels sprouts, broccoli and cauliflower now through early August.  Parsnips also need to be started now (they take a long time to germinate so be prepared to keep the seed bed moist for a couple of weeks).  By early August I start thinking about fall carrots and beets.   Because the day length is so short in the fall months, most fall crops need to get established in August, though some can be started in September.  Also think about doing a summer cover crop of buckwheat if you have a bed sitting empty.  It grows really fast, is great for the bees, you can eat the young greens and it accumulates insoluble phosphorous and releases it in a more available form when it gets turned under. 

Keeping vegetables well harvested and flowers deadheaded will give you a much longer season.  The reason is that plants main purpose is reproducing so they are making sure they have mature seed.  When you leave a giant zucchini on the plant or don’t harvest your beans regularly, the plant “thinks” it has its seed production set and slows down on producing more.  If you keep it harvested, the plant continues to produce.  Flowers are similar, deadheading flowers as they start to fade tells the plant to start all over again to get more seed.   It is worth the time to go out in the garden on a daily basis and harvest and deadhead to get the month more of harvest and beauty. 

Another thing that helps keep plants producing is lowering their stress level, lack of water, overheating, low nutrients all create stress.  Stressed plants have a much shorter time of production.  Try to be even about your watering, tons of water once and then a drought for two weeks is not so good, better to have a regular even amount.  Mulching the soil with straw can help with overheating and keeping moisture in the ground.  Remember plants do not like to be watered in the heat of the day.  As Wendy mentioned in an earlier post, it is normal for a plant to wilt a bit when it gets hot.  Don’t rush out and spray it with water, it will only make it worse.  Wait until the evening and test the soil for moisture, if it looked really wilted and the soil is dry, give it a nice evening soak. 

I want to give my appreciation for timers.  For years I would put on a sprinkler or a drip system and then forget about it, which in one situation would drain a small water tank and in another would run up my water bill.  The simplest is just mechanical rotary timer that will run water up to 2 hours - simple, makes it so you can leave after you put the water on, you can use with a sprinkler or a drip system.  The other simple one is a battery timer that you can program to come on a certain time for a certain amount of minutes.  There are more complex systems worth looking at if you are doing a major new system. I have never regretted my investment in timers to simplify the watering process.

I am curious if anyone has tomatoes yet, mine look far off as the cool, wet spring had me planting really late and plants grew slowly at first.   My summer garden will be later than normal but in a few weeks everything should be going full steam. I have a delicious yellow Romano pole bean called Gold of Bacau that I can hardly wait for, my first tomatoes look like they might be Striped Romans, and my Gypsy pepper has a full crop getting big.  I can see a meal coming together as I write this. Yum!