Is anyone gardening in Phoenix. What will you do to save your garden these next few weeks?
Watering, shade canopy, a prayer. What else!?
by SolJamn
10 Comments
UnAvailableCat
Ouch! Your lows are our highs this week. Even here in CO I’ve got thick mulch and shade covers
Juskit10around
Garden Shade cloth from Amazon, I’m in Louisiana. The 40% one will work. It’s around $15 for a 10X10 one. They drastically reduces plant stress and temperature by 5-10 degrees.
Watering twice a day isn’t out of the question here. Mulch will help stop evaporation and keep the soil temperature down. If you have the setup for shade cloth, use it.
carlitospig
As someone in Sacramento (normally that is my forecast, we’ve just been really lucky this year), I always take July off. The only thing I do is water (sometimes 2xday, and don’t forget extra mulch), and let the garden do whatever the hell it wants to.
TeilzeitOptimist
Avoid watering during noon or afternoon. Water in the morning or evening.
Cover soil with mulch or foil to lower evaporation during the day.
And anyone planning to buy solar panels anyway, the half transparent solarpanels for shading, seem more and more viable in a garden.
dnsmayhem
I have frames over my garden beds, topped with 30% shade cloth starting in May. Been doing that for a few years, and works well. I water early morning, and in the really bad heat, add another in the evening. My peppers, eggplant and tomatoes are producing, and the tomatillos are in full insane growth mode. 🙄 The basil, mint, sage and oregano are doing well, the thyme is a little unhappy, but surviving. I’ve got four new raised beds that aren’t planted yet, those will get shade cloth next summer.
oryanAZ
shade and deep watering. i’m in the phoenix area and i don’t water every day but have sunflowers that shade a good part of my garden and I water very deeply. i get flood irrigation so it penetrates several feet deep once every 2 weeks and then i’ll water every 2-3 days to maintain. it works pretty well. in general you want to avoid the type of watering that moistens the top layer but doesn’t really get to the deep roots. that doesn’t do much here and you’ll see your plants wilt.
sam99871
Holy cow, that is brutal. What is the opposite of zone envy?
Tinyberzerker
I’m in Austin and I water everyday and have put up 40% sun shades. Tomatoes are not doing well at all and my peppers are not producing. We just went through weeks of 100+ degrees most days and high humidity.
10 Comments
Ouch! Your lows are our highs this week. Even here in CO I’ve got thick mulch and shade covers
Garden Shade cloth from Amazon, I’m in Louisiana. The 40% one will work. It’s around $15 for a 10X10 one. They drastically reduces plant stress and temperature by 5-10 degrees.
Move to New York
https://preview.redd.it/imop6bt97m9b1.jpeg?width=1284&format=pjpg&auto=webp&v=enabled&s=b7729397e57c981782b2fb5faf53d51e42e94e98
Watering twice a day isn’t out of the question here. Mulch will help stop evaporation and keep the soil temperature down. If you have the setup for shade cloth, use it.
As someone in Sacramento (normally that is my forecast, we’ve just been really lucky this year), I always take July off. The only thing I do is water (sometimes 2xday, and don’t forget extra mulch), and let the garden do whatever the hell it wants to.
Avoid watering during noon or afternoon.
Water in the morning or evening.
Cover soil with mulch or foil to lower evaporation during the day.
And anyone planning to buy solar panels anyway, the half transparent solarpanels for shading, seem more and more viable in a garden.
I have frames over my garden beds, topped with 30% shade cloth starting in May. Been doing that for a few years, and works well. I water early morning, and in the really bad heat, add another in the evening.
My peppers, eggplant and tomatoes are producing, and the tomatillos are in full insane growth mode. 🙄 The basil, mint, sage and oregano are doing well, the thyme is a little unhappy, but surviving.
I’ve got four new raised beds that aren’t planted yet, those will get shade cloth next summer.
shade and deep watering. i’m in the phoenix area and i don’t water every day but have sunflowers that shade a good part of my garden and I water very deeply. i get flood irrigation so it penetrates several feet deep once every 2 weeks and then i’ll water every 2-3 days to maintain. it works pretty well. in general you want to avoid the type of watering that moistens the top layer but doesn’t really get to the deep roots. that doesn’t do much here and you’ll see your plants wilt.
Holy cow, that is brutal. What is the opposite of zone envy?
I’m in Austin and I water everyday and have put up 40% sun shades. Tomatoes are not doing well at all and my peppers are not producing. We just went through weeks of 100+ degrees most days and high humidity.