Gardening, anyone?
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Melissa we had some extremely hot weather here (for us) and I had to water twice a day. Pretty soon its too hot to even care if it all lives. Fortunately we are back to cool and getting some rain. It seems like the year I plant hot weather annuals it ends up cool and rainy and then if I plant cool loving plants it ends up super hot. This year we have alternated between the two, back and forth.
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I was lucky this year, in that I was really late buying annuals, so hadn't done it when it started hitting high nineties in late April. Since the handwriting was on the wall for this summerI decided to skip it this year.
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110? I can't even imagine that's a temperature where anything can survive! let alone plants... gosh! last year we got a few days with 95F and I thought it was hell. (Centr. Europe here and in hills)
Imurphy - - your dinner looks delicious and it's great that it's all of your garden. And with salmon too! wow
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Been in the low 100s here the past week. I was up in Santa Fe yesterday and it was mid 90s and steadying watched the the therm in the car creep up until I hit ABQ late afternoon with a temp of 103. Usually by now things are cooler with summer monsoonal rains.......
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JaBoo, It's supposed to be 91 here today and they've issued a heat warning and the radio listed places to go to get cool. The paper says we have the least air conditioning of any metro area in the lower states. I'm guessing Alaska possibly has less. We don't have any because it's usually only hot a couple of weeks during the summer. There's always the basement or deck.
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True that! It's in the upper 70s today and not an A/C to be found here in Haines, AK. It was 105 in the greenhouse yesterday and I'll be watering the plants in there all day today. Even the columbines are wilting! This picture is from BEFORE the heat wave.
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Lmurphy- you are lucky to get the columbines to go at all in the TX heat (I lived in the DFW once and know your pain). We have them here, but usually up in the higher areas in the mountains. Your photo is lovely!
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We summer in Alaska to avoid TX heat! Not sure there is a single columbine in the state of TX! They would probably grow in northern NM, yes?
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Lmurphy- that is a smart idea to go to AK for the summer! Yes, you will see some columbines in the mountains of northern NM. I have seen most of them in Colorado though, they like the climate there the best.
It has been too hot and dry here again (temps in the 100s), but the monsoons came back last night and flooded Santa Fe to the north of here. Three inches in less than an hour in a place that gets 8 inches on average per year. The storm missed my house last night but hearing we are getting 10 days of monsoonal moisture again so I am hopeful....
If any of you are in the flooded areas back east, please be careful. Extreme heat or floods seem to the name of the game this summer.
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imurphy, DH and I agreed you have the perfect setup. Corpus is nice in the winter and Alaska in the summer is awesome.
A friend sent me a link to a DIY air conditioner. https://www.moneytalksnews.com/how-make-8-air-conditioner/?utm_source=newsletter&utm_campaign=email-2018-07-24-am&utm_medium=email&subscriber=yes
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Loved the A/C link! Thank you. I have to be very careful wishing for rain because our monsoon typically begins in early September and lasts until winter. So I am appreciating our rare sunny days and don't grumble too much while hauling water daily to water our raised beds. My delphinium is finally in bloom! Sissy the cat wanted in the picture....
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Melissa my family is from OK but I grew up in Chicago. We visited every summer so I remember 106 but not 110. We would go go the lake on the weekend and the water was like bathwater.
Jazzy I know NM needs that rain but maybe not all at once. Wren, I coulnt believe when you said 91. i have Seattle on my weather channel app because my sonwants to move there and we are always comparing weather. I will be so excited to tell him its cooler in Chicago than Seattle for once.
Gorgeous Delphinium lmurphy. I love that they are true blue.
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DH is still in the hospital with his procedure scheduled for tomorrow am. His sister arrives about noon. I'm trying to get the house semi-clean for her arrival. I do a half hour of something and have to drink water and cool off before doing more. I have definitely acclimated to Seattle. I tried to water the plants enough to give them hope.
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Two hobbies- we had some floods up in Santa Fe earlier this week, but now the rains are more steady every night. I think more coming tonight. With the heat and dryness, the ground is hard packed clay and thus, water runs off vs. soaks in. My yard is happy with any moisture!
Wren- best wishes for a positive outcome on DH's procedure tomorrow. Sending you big hugs!
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Thank you Jazzy. I needed those.
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Wren, hope DH is recovering nicely. Here are some Alaskan wild flowers for you.
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My cucumbers are growing and the beans need to be harvested.
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Thanks. Alaskan flowers are so pretty in the summer. And they're everywhere. After months of white, people just want color. Anchorage had huge planters all over downtown when we lived there. And once I saw a yard that started in the back with tall purple delphiniums and graded in size and color to short white ones in front. Gorgeous.
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A smattering of the berries we are picking right now! Strawberries, currants, raspberries, blueberries...on my!
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lmurphy- Know what I’m hearing? Time for pie! 😊
Glad I got an early harvest of squash and zucchini, because I lost most of my plants to squash vine borers. ☹️ Also glad that whether my family eats or not isn’t dependent on my ability to grow food! Most of my gardening is a learning experience, and now I know how to look for and deal with vine borers. Yay for the internet!
Right now, it’s tomato time. And a fistful of green beans here and there. And the peppers are still going.
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Beautiful picture. I'm a backyard enthusiast in garden, perennials, and milkweed for monarchs. Miss it terribly. Live in Pearland, Tx just south of Houston. Too d$@& hot for me to set foot outside except for doctors and treatment so I watch The butterflies outside my bedroom window. I know it sounds strange but if I can't dig in the dirt and grow plants I don't really feel alive so after my infusion yesterday my husband took me to Home Depot and I bought an inside plant I had never seen beforeto see if I could keep it alive. Go figure.
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JoE we hear you on the diggin in the dirt being good for your mental health. Last year, I did fairy gardens in containers. That was so fun for me to do and can be done and kept indoors. This has been such a hot muggy summer for many of us. I didnt enjoy it much myself and now my yard is flagged and torn up for natural gas main replacement so anything more is wasted, visually.
Produce wise it was a bad year. Green peppers didnt like containers. I got almost no cherries. Herbs didnt like the weather either. I think my cantaloupe experiment failed. I have blooms but not seeing any fruit set yet and fall is nearly here in my climate. Flowers did a little better. 0 -
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my hibiscus plants are blooming! We have tried to grow them three years in a row without success because some creature likes to chew them down to the ground. But this year, I think we made it! I love hibiscus as they remind me of growing up in So Calif.
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twohobbies - fabulous hydrangeas!
Dodgesgirl the hibiscus is beautiful!
I have taken some pictures too
anemones... I love them
various shades of yellow...
pumpkin season is comming... a plant a haven't even planted! It just grew from seeds I threw out to the compost pile. now has at least 6 bigger pumpkins and some smaller ones
I don't know what to do with all the zucchini... I bake it with potatoes, make mincemeat and add zucchini, bake a zucchini cake... and gift them away - but still, there are some more
I have done some garden work this week, it's so relaxing... my next AC is tommorrow
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JaBoo- love the photos!
I am trying something new to me with zucchini. I read you can freeze grated zucchini for 6 months so I grated a bunch and drained off the extra moisture. Then vacuum sealed 2 cups into individual bags and froze. 2 cups is what my zucchini bread uses so I hope to pull it out in the fall for more zucchini bread.
I also roast a lot of zucchini- cut into chunks, lightly coat with oil and desired spices then roast for about 45 mins to carmalize the pieces
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jaboo- Ahh, yes, the compost invaders- last year it was cukes that grew on their own and did really well, this year it was tomatoes, that have also done well. I try to let things that are ornery enough to come up on their own to have at it, within reason. Those are the strong little buggers usually.
As for using up zucchini, aside from the usual, I just learned this year that it’s fine raw. So now I make sticks to go with hummus, or I make a big batch of zucchini salsa, and I also fry it with the meat for the pasta sauce. My son has been joking that it’s my new secret ingredient in Everything!
Dodgersgirl- I’m very interested in how it turns out after freezing, please keep us posted. I read that it has to be blanched first, but if it works for you, that’s exciting.
Love the pics ladies!
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Visitor on my deck today
One of my surprise sunflowers
Today’s evening harvest
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Your pictures make me so...HAPPY! It's nice knowing I'm not the only one who thinks dirty fingernails are a badge of honor! Gardening is truly my therapy. But I don't plant zucchinis any more. I have JUST enough from friends giving them away! It is a rainy, blustery day in Alaska and I'm going to be making zucchini bread. Here is a picture of our Alaska hideaway from last week...when we had a rare sunny day!
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I love all the baskets of flowers - and the prayer flags.
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