It has been an interesting month for gardening. Many of the photos I’ve taken are a bit hard to see as its been cloudy with a slight dust cloud overhanging in the area for a couple of days. Mix in a lot of what feels like one-hundred degree days and buckets of rain when it’s not. I’m shocked the plants have survived the dramatic swings of nature this month.
Bell Peppers
A lot of these high degree days seem to have sent the local infestations into overdrive. My peppers have been battling what appears to be aphids or mites for most of June. Lots of leaves lost and growth seems to have slowed down as well.
My green pepper seems to have been hit the hardest. I have been watering them down and hand washing the leaves for all three of my bell pepper plants. Along with using some sprays to try and knock down the issue. In some instances, I just started to remove the more heavily infected and damaged parts as part of pest control. It’s still an ongoing battle.
My third plant has started to produce some bell peppers as well. I’m rather enjoying having three plants as they are now going around in a cycle of having something every couple of weeks.
Despite the rough month, I did get 2 green and 2 red bell peppers. I did give them a good washing and inspection before eating. Sometimes you just have to deal with a little extra nature to still enjoy the things.
Tomatoes
I was hoping by now my tomatoes would be doing something. It seems like it’s going be a slow season as anyone else I know around me is having issues as well. They both more or less look the same now.
At least in the last half of June, they have seemed to want to grow taller. I can only hope these high heats are exactly what they have been waiting on. As a result, I’ve been watering them daily sometimes two a day. They sure are thirsty.
Jalapeno
Outside of the leaves being rather limp, it’s like nothing affects my jalapeno and the ability to produce. It has been riddled with aphides, forgot about during a flash flood, and I’ll admit I don’t always water it along with everything else either. Despite that, it’s Jalapenos for days.
I think there around thirty Jalapenos on the plant at this time. Almost all of them have been ready to pick for the better part of a week if not longer. I’ve eaten around dozen this month and shared them as well. If I pick them more will replace them in no time!
Herbs
Last month my herbs were doing great. This time around some of them are on the edge of survival and many others seem to be in the process of withering away. Too much rain and mixed with a lot of hot days is not what they ordered it seems. I have even been moving them into a shaded area from time to time as I felt needed.
In the photo above my basil and cilantro are not doing so great. One of them is my fault and the other I’m just wondering if it’s not happy about the heat. Both of them have been getting a lot of water.
It turns out I love pesto which is something I’m not quite sure I’ve had much of if any in my life. The downside is it took almost an entire basil plant to make it. I had left it with about four times the amount of leaves it has now. At least it’s still holding in there. I’ve been considering getting three or four more basil plants.
I’m not that concerned about the parsley that can be seen in the cover photo of this post. I have yet to find any large scale application other than clipping off a little here or there. Even if I do end up losing a large portion of the parsley it’s been keeping up with my usage.
For the entire month, my Dill plant has not been happy one bit. It seems to be slowly degrading and is looking worse by the week. The container’s in also has a decent drain so I’m not quite sure what the deal is. I’ve tried putting in a shaded area for a few days to see if that helps at all.
I’ve given up on another attempt to grow some herbs from seeds. I’m willing to admit now the seeds I have been trying to use over the past couple of years suck. Nothing seems to work even putting them in a damp paper towel only gets them to mold.
Final Thoughts
Despite some struggles with the garden and these high temperatures, it has been a fun month. I find it rather relaxing going out and seeing how things are growing. I hope everyone has had a decent month.
Garden Journal 2020
Information
Photos were taken and content was written by @Enjar.
@Simplymike runs the monthly Community Garden Journal Challenge which you can find here
