Florida’s summers and vegetable gardening do not always seem compatible. Despite the heat, our vegetable gardens can be highly productive or prepared for cooler seasons. Join the Master Gardener Volunteers at the Hilliard Branch Library to learn about our latest recommendations and tips for managing your summer vegetable garden.
Feel free to check out all of our upcoming programs. They can be found here: https://blogs.ifas.ufl.edu/nassauco/
Attached is a copy of the PowerPoint and below are additional resources related to the program.
Florida Vegetable Gardening Guide: https://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/publication/VH021
Summer Vegetables in Florida: https://sfyl.ifas.ufl.edu/lawn-and-garden/summer-vegetables-in-florida/
Cover Crops for Nematode Management: https://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/publication/VH037
Green Manure and Cover Crops: https://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/publication/AG277
Natural Products for Managing Garden Pests: https://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/publication/IN197
Taylor Clem: So good morning, everybody. My name is Dr. Taylor, Clem. I’m with Ufos extension, Nassau County, and today we have Bobby with us. She is one of our master gardener volunteers, and she’s going to be speaking about summer vegetable gardening Taylor Clem: so I do appreciate everyone taking the time to join in online. There’s a couple of things that we have going on today. That, you’ll notice is you know, for online, feel free to put any of your questions in the chat box, I’ll be helping moderate that throughout the program as well as all of our programs, we’re gonna be recording it. Taylor Clem: and we’ll post it up onto our online Youtube channel for any time. You all wanna review later. And then we’ll follow up with some additional documents associated with today’s program. So without further ado, I wanna introduce Bobby and say, Thank you so much for joining us, and I’ll let her take over. So thank you so much. Taylor Clem: Hello, everybody. Taylor Clem: So today we’re talking about summer vegetable gardening in North Florida. Taylor Clem: T, Taylor Clem: okay, we’ll use the clicker. Taylor Clem: It’s not plugged in. Taylor Clem: So my error. There we go. Now you should be good. Okay. Taylor Clem: alright. So most of us, when we think about oh, it didn’t actually. Taylor Clem: there we go, most of us, when we think about gardening in as a summer vegetable garden in general, we tend to think about the crops that we would make a salad with. We tend to think about your tomatoes and cucumbers, and the temperate crops that we would grow in any location other than Taylor Clem: Florida or the deep South Taylor Clem: and these crops tend to like a more mild season that we definitely do not have in Florida. Taylor Clem: So our ideal seasons for growing vegetables are actually in fall and spring, not in summer, and fall and spring. Our humidity drops, our temperatures drops we can control. We can control a lot of the hum, the water more cause we don’t have. The monsoon rains as much. Taylor Clem: so the question is, how can we actually grow a summer garden? Taylor Clem: One idea is we can flip what we do in the summer. We can think of doing winter work in summer garden and not grow vegetables. Taylor Clem: Another option is change the way we think of approaching our summer garden. Maybe actually grow some different crops that we’ve never thought of Taylor Clem: that might actually not just tolerate it here, maybe even thrive, maybe just survive. Taylor Clem: So North Florida is a subtropic climate and a subtropic climate is defined as having at least 8 months with immune temperature above 50 degrees, and with that comes monsoon rains. Taylor Clem: People, monsoon rains. We have frequent downpours in the hot season, and then dry periods in the cold season. Taylor Clem: So with that Taylor Clem: with that. Taylor Clem: Taylor, is there a reason Taylor Clem: my notes are for the next slide and not the previous side, not the current side. Taylor Clem: No, this should be the notes for this current slide. Taylor Clem: Yeah, so we need to adjust our thinking to match these conditions. And look at some other regions that are subtropic as well. And we might find some other crops looking at that, that we might not even recognize that deal with the heat and humidity that we actually have. Taylor Clem: So what are some of the challenges that we have in the Summer Garden. Taylor Clem: Obviously, we all know pests. Taylor Clem: Pests are the big one, and heat and humidity. All of these things thrive in abundance, and our vegetables do not Taylor Clem: So plant selection makes all the difference. In how how successful our garden actually is. Fungus in particular is gonna be out on the force. Taylor Clem: So some ideas of what we can do if we do decide to kind of flip our seasons and not grow things. And we decide we wanna kind of do some winter work in summer. That would be an opportunity to solarize our garden. Taylor Clem: Solarizing would give us an opportunity to manage our weeds and pests. Kill off nematodes and disease. Anything that has taken a stronghold in our garden over the last few seasons. Taylor Clem: Which here Taylor Clem: is definitely a problem. Taylor Clem: We can plant cover crops. Which have some major benefits. We can also take that opportunity to tidy repair, expand our gardens, maybe build those raised beds. You’ve wanted to install some drippy irrigation for the coming dry season. Just don’t let yourself get some heat exhaustion. Taylor Clem: What is solarization Taylor Clem: as well as we are going to get into both of those things in the next slides? Yeah, so next slide solarization. Taylor Clem: So solarization is practice of basically trap the heat into the soil Taylor Clem: so that it gets so hot it kills off everything in the top several inches of the soil. Taylor Clem: So in order to do this, you need to have a very sunny area. Over your garden. It can’t be shaded. You need to use you need to clear out all of the existing weeds. It needs to be bare dirt. Taylor Clem: You wanna till it up so that it’s nice and fluffy and easily penetrated. And then you gotta use clear plastic. It can’t be a foggy white plastic or definitely not a black plastic. It has to be clear so the sun can actually penetrate and then, ideally, you’ll wanna do it a day after it’s rained or you’ve irrigated. But you don’t want it to be, you know, muddy, not after a monsoon Taylor Clem: And then when you cover it with the plastic, you’re going to want to bury the edges of it to seal in the heat. Taylor Clem: You don’t want any of that heat to escape. Taylor Clem: and then you’re gonna leave it there for at least 6 weeks Taylor Clem: longer is Taylor Clem: okay, or even better, because sometimes there’s overcast days, things that can definitely impact the success of it. So there are some drawbacks as well. The temperatures are not only hot enough to kill pests Taylor Clem: bacterias fungus. All the daddies living in new dirt, but they’re also high enough. They will kill off the good as well. But luckily Taylor Clem: the good microorganisms are they repopulate quickly Taylor Clem: and it’s easy to replenish these by adding things like compost warm castings. Those type things back in things that you would probably add in at the start of a new season, anyway. Taylor Clem: But even if you don’t, they will recolonize quickly. Taylor Clem: A couple of more drawbacks is, if you do get overcast summer days, that will reduce the efficiency of it. So you’ll definitely want to extend the period beyond 6 weeks. In that case, if you get holes, you’ll definitely want to seal those up because any opportunity for heat to escape is going to diminish the success of it. Taylor Clem: There are some Edis documents on this. If you want some more information. Couple of names of documents are introduction to solarization and solarization for pest management. Taylor Clem: But you can just go to Edis and type in solarization, and you will get several results. Taylor Clem: Do you? Is it less successful on raised beds? I’m just curious because Taylor Clem: the raised beds don’t have the ground installation, so are there different procedures for raised beds? Do you need to leave it on there longer? Taylor Clem: I’m not sure about that, but I do know in general, raised beds tend to heat up faster than in the ground beds. Because of the ambient heat around them. So I would think that that would be more successful. Oh, oh, yeah, there was a question of if this is all different with raised beds than ground beds. Taylor Clem: And I I don’t. I don’t believe that’s the case. Taylor Clem: Jackie. Taylor Clem: We use the raised beds at the junior master gardener with the Voice and Girls club. And it’s very successful and make sure they know Taylor Clem: clear plastic. Only, yeah, yeah, definitely clear plastic. So Jacky was saying that they do it in some raised beds at Junior boys and girls clubs. Is that it? And and it’s very successful. Yeah, I mean raised beds, that is, that is one of the benefits of raised beds, too, is they do tend to heat up in general faster than the ground. So. Taylor Clem: yeah. Taylor Clem: okay. Taylor Clem: cover crops. Taylor Clem: So cover crops are referred to as living mulch or green manure Taylor Clem: and basically, they are a crop that you plant and you let it grow and cover the surface of the soil, and then you come back. You chop it down, you let it decompose so there are some benefits of it. Taylor Clem: depending on which crop you choose to grow. Some of them will increase the nitrogen and fertility in the soil. Taylor Clem: All of them will offer weed control, and they’ll protect soil from things like erosion. And you know. Taylor Clem: seed, you know, seeds taking hold. Some of them are particularly useful for controlling nematodes, and all of them will help keep the food web in the soil going. Taylor Clem: so cover crops are another really good option for your summer garden. If you’re not going to be growing vegetables. Taylor Clem: So if you do choose to grow, cover crops. Taylor Clem: what you do is you plant them. Taylor Clem: and then you let them grow to the point of when they’re just Taylor Clem: just about maturity, not at the point of setting seed. So you go until they begin to flower until about 25% of it has floured, but none of it has set any seed. Taylor Clem: and then you chop it down. Taylor Clem: Once you chop it down, you have a couple of options, you can chop and drop, let it sit on the surface and decompose. That’ll also act as a mulch. If you do it that way, or you can till it into the soil and let it decompose in the soil. Taylor Clem: Or you can take it out and check it in your compost bin. Taylor Clem: So if you do want more information on cover crops, you can go to Edis and type in cover crops. I didn’t list any specific Edis documents here, because they have a number of them where they will list based on your specific goal. So if you want to plan a cover crop geared towards increasing your nitrogen. Taylor Clem: They have tables of crops and information geared towards that. If you’re looking to reduce nematodes Taylor Clem: so I would recommend going to Edis and just type in cover crops and you’ll find a document that is good for that Taylor Clem: nematope control and solarization. And I did mention online. For you all to know that sun hemp is a great cover crop Taylor Clem: for nematode control when you’re using the green manure or a top press like a combo like this. Taylor Clem: There are. There are a a few of them that that is, one definitely at the top, and and then Taylor Clem: There were a few. If you if you look on Edis, they have a document that lists like 5. I think there were like 5 of them. Oh, awesome. Yeah. So Taylor, seeing that he sun hemp. Oh, you already put it in chat. Oh, okay, yes. Taylor’s gonna send out Taylor Clem: a document. That lists warm season and cold season cover crops. Taylor Clem: for for our area. Taylor Clem: So if you are going to garden in the summer, you don’t want to do winter work, you’re determined to grow your vegetable garden. Taylor Clem: Some things to consider Taylor Clem: are, the length of the growing season. Our growing season is only 3 months long, and our prime seasons are really spring and fall. So how long is it going to take for the maturity of the plants you wanna grow? Are they going to overlap those seasons? Taylor Clem: What kind of space do you have available in your garden, and are you willing to pull out your existing plants Taylor Clem: to make room for those summer crops. Taylor Clem: These are these are things that you have to kind of. Think about, to plan out what you actually want to do with the space you have available. Taylor Clem: some more things are how you actually wanna design your gardens. Do you wanna have raised beds? Raised beds are awesome, especially for the summer gardens, because you can control the water a little bit. More. Things aren’t sitting getting bogged down with our monsoons. Taylor Clem: If you do choose to grow in containers, you need to absolutely make sure that you have adequate drainage in them. Because blight is a serious problem. As you get throughout our late season. Blight, in particular, can be a major problem. If you Taylor Clem: don’t have adequate drainage. You can definitely be more prone to problems like that. Nutrients Taylor Clem: are. You need to be careful with your fertilization, cause nutrients are much more prone to leaching throughout that season, and your vegetables are really heavy feeders in general. We we ask a lot of them. We ask them to grow an entire lifespan, put out a lot of fruit. Taylor Clem: In a very short period of time. So they require a lot of food in order to do that. And with a lot of rain Taylor Clem: lot of that’s getting flushed through the soil. Taylor Clem: And another important element is, you got a mulch? Taylor Clem: the sun as much rain as we get. The sun will dry out of those top few inches faster than you can keep out up with, and vegetables often do have shallow roots, because they have such a short lifespan. So Taylor Clem: mulching is definitely going to be your friend to suppress the weeds, prevent the erosion. Build up the soil, and maintain that moisture particularly in your red raised beds. Taylor Clem: For your plans. Taylor Clem: So if you want to grow veggies. Taylor Clem: what are some of the veggies we can grow. Taylor Clem: So we’re gonna go through a list of crops. Some of them are Taylor Clem: gonna thrive. Some of them are just going to survive. Taylor Clem: Some of them are gonna survive for part of the season might die off part way through the season. Taylor Clem: and most of this is through trial and error. Just you know people growing things and having success. Taylor Clem: But a lot of these are things you probably never heard of, because they come from other subtropical regions. Taylor Clem: So the 1st one. Everybody wants to grow their tomatoes, and there are some tomatoes that we can indeed grow in the summer here. 1st kind of category is cherry tomatoes. You’re gonna have the most success with cherry tomatoes. Taylor Clem: you can plant them in the spring or summer, and the major difference with cherry tomatoes is, they will continue to set fruit above 85 degrees, whereas most tomatoes won’t. There are some full size tomatoes that will, but most of them won’t Taylor Clem: they like all tomatoes, they like full sun. However, they will tolerate some sheet, especially here. Our version of full sun is Taylor Clem: is intense, so they they will handle. Taylor Clem: They will handle some filtered from from our filtered sun. You’re gonna want to cage them, fertilize them heavily, and you need to pick their fruit Taylor Clem: as soon as it’s ripe, heavy rains will lead to split fruit very quickly, especially on the cherry tomatoes. One heavy rain can split them in a day. Some really good varieties, for here are the sweet 100 s. The grape tomatoes. Taylor Clem: Tiny Tom sun, golds, BHN. 6, 2 fours, Evergrades, sweet millions. The Everglades in particular, are kind of our non native natives, so to speak. They’re actually a different different species of tomatoes Taylor Clem: and kind of referred to as a current tomato and they’re actually tolerant of salt. So if you live in a salty location, they’re tolerant of salt winds and brackish waters, so like, if you live out on the island, they could be a good option for you. Taylor Clem: If you want full sized tomatoes, there are some heat resistant, full size, tomatoes that will also set fruit over 85 degrees. We have the heat miser, solar set solar flare, Florida, 91. Better boy celebrity and Amelia. There are some heirlooms also. I’m partial to the heirloom, so I’m happy. There are few here, particularly the Cherokee purple green zebra, mortgage lifters and redcers. Taylor Clem: Again fertilize water, and you’ve gotta be out scouting for insects very often with tomatoes insects Taylor Clem: 0 in on them very quickly Taylor Clem: crop that thrives. Here is peppers again. We’re looking at more traditional crops now. Peppers, you know, plant in spring or summer. They are very productive plant and sun they actually can handle, you know, some some dry spells. Again, fertilizing is really important. Taylor Clem: and we have some varieties listed here. Some hots and sweets. Taylor Clem: I grow Taylor Clem: new varieties every year, and I’m yet to find a pepper that has not grown here Taylor Clem: pretty much. Everything I’ve stuck in the ground has absolutely thrived and produced prolifically. So. Taylor Clem: but the the ones on the screen here. The date data is is, I, I believe. Taylor Clem: is that one native? I I don’t. Oh, okay, that’s a cool story from northeast Florida. I thought I read somewhere. It was from like Saint Augustine or something. Taylor Clem: So the story about that is really cool, because it’s kind of like immersed in popularity. But how it got here and why? So it’s it’s so it’s special to the culture. And around August kind of like the seminal pumpkin ever place. People say they’re native, but they’re not actually okay. Taylor Clem: Okay. So the dates not native, but all all of these on screen the data have narrow Jalapeno ghost. All the Chilies we’ve gone. The the bells, Cuban bananas as as barkeys, all the Italian ones. Yes, all of these Taylor Clem: drive in the summer. Here Taylor Clem: there are some greens that you can grow here. Taylor Clem: That are good spinach replacements. There’s a New Zealand spinach. Taylor Clem: That one is kind of like a a rambling vine that will just spread out across the ground. I grow that one. And I really like that one. There’s Okinawa, Malabar, Ethiopian kale. Taylor Clem: and all of these, you know, you can. Just. They don’t require very much fertilizer, and you just harvest up to a 3rd at a time. Taylor Clem: Asian greens will grow well. So we’ve got the mustard greens. Taylor Clem: Eukina, Savoy, tatsuy they’re typically grown in fall and spring, but they’ll also grow in the summer here. Taylor Clem: So another one is leaf amaranth. Taylor Clem: So you’d eat the the young shoots, and it’ll reseed itself and become weedy. It is susceptible to fungus and caterpillars. Taylor Clem: and it does it does thrive in hot and humid regions. So it does. Well, here Taylor Clem: eggplant is another one that does really well here. Taylor Clem: It loves the sun. It loves the heat just like the peppers and tomatoes. Water well, fertilize every 2 or 3 weeks. Check for pests. Taylor Clem: All that same stuff. Taylor Clem: Okra. Taylor Clem: okra is one that everyone thinks of when Taylor Clem: south. Taylor Clem: You can plan it all summer long from spring through summer Taylor Clem: it loves the blazing sun, and you can direct sew it. Taylor Clem: You wanna give each plant plenty of space and water it well, and you need to make sure that you harvest the pods very often, and with clippers. If you let it go too long? Taylor Clem: Not only will the pods become pretty much inedible. Taylor Clem: They kind of turn to wood. It’ll stop producing Taylor Clem: so it’s in the hibiscus family. It’s it’s related to the hibiscus plants that we that we know for their flowers. And some good varieties. Here are the Alabama, red baby, Bubba Clemson, spineless, ever tender, and little Lucy. Taylor Clem: And now we’re getting into a couple that some people might not be familiar with. We have a. And I’m probably gonna butcher this pronunciation. Tao Taylor Clem: coyote Kyoti. This one is native to Southern Mexico and Guatemala. Taylor Clem: It is a vigorous vine Taylor Clem: and you actually can start it by planting the fruit. Taylor Clem: and it’s a perennial once you have it. It’s a very mild fruit that you you use like a squash. Taylor Clem: So which is interesting because a lot of a lot of squash doesn’t particularly thrive here. But this one is good because it is a perennial. Taylor Clem: You can cook it like a squash. It’s mild, absorbs the flavors of whatever you’re you’re cooking it with, and you can eat the the young shoots as vegetable themselves. Taylor Clem: Next we have sweet potatoes. Taylor Clem: and I don’t know how to pronounce, but bon boniato, but Bonato Taylor’s got these bonato Taylor Clem: so slips or sweet potatoes, we plant a little different than regular potatoes. We plant slips, which are Taylor Clem: the green plant that grow off of them. When you let them sit in your pantry too long. Taylor Clem: So Taylor Clem: you plant those in mounds in the ground once they’re once they’re nice and healthy looking, and you leave them there for a long time, you can actually eat the greens as they’re growing. They’re nice and tender leaves. Taylor Clem: and so it’s kind of a Taylor Clem: a dual purpose crop as well, so you can eat the leaves. As the the tubers are growing under the ground, they are susceptible to white fly later in the summer. You’re gonna need to leave them there for a really long time. So you plant them early in the summer, and then you’re gonna harvest them. Taylor Clem: Gosh! Sometime in the fall. Taylor Clem: late summer, early fall. Yes, yes, you just look at the beautiful foliage and eat it sometimes. Taylor Clem: some Taylor Clem: some. It’s Taylor Clem: when you grow sweet potatoes. One important thing is, they have to be cured Taylor Clem: in order for them to actually become sweet potatoes. So this is something that I if you choose to grow them, you’ll probably look into, but it is something to to note that they do require curing to generate the sugars that actually make them sweet, and that that requires being kept in a dark place over 85 degrees, with a high humidity for for a couple of weeks. It is a good idea Taylor Clem: to start with certified slips that you can order to make sure that they are free of weevils and nematodes that they’re prone to Taylor Clem: versus just starting with your own. You don’t know kind of. Taylor Clem: If you’re if you’re starting with infected plants at that point Taylor Clem: another option, if you like. Your green beans, green beans tend to not really thrive here, but yard long. Beans do. There are several different varieties. They come from Southern Asia. Taylor Clem: They come in greens, reds, purples, and Taylor Clem: they’re basically like a green bean. The interesting thing is, they all turn out green. When you cook them regardless of the color they start out on on the plant. Taylor Clem: They’ll grow. Taylor Clem: They’ll they’ll grow Taylor Clem: one to 3 feet long, depending on how long you leave them on on the plant and they grow just like a pollbean. Taylor Clem: They’re very prolific. They are prone to aphids, but it’s really easy to get a fits off. Excuse me, it’s really easy to get the aphids off. You can just slide them off with your fingers or blast them off with the hose. I find it to be one of the easiest plants to get eights off of, actually cause they tend to just go for the stems. Taylor Clem: Another one is winged beans. I had never heard of this one. But it apparently thrives in hot, humid weather is a vigorous fine, and Taylor Clem: you can eat the beans, eat the tender beans, dry the beans, and apparently eat the root, which is pretty cool. It is susceptible to some fungus, but it has no major pest issues. Taylor Clem: Another. One is the Azuki bean. Taylor Clem: That has grown to be a dry bean. Taylor Clem: It’s really tolerant to insects. Taylor Clem: and but it does compete poorly with weeds. So if you want to grow a dried bean, that is a good one to go with Taylor Clem: Lima beans. Taylor Clem: Lima beans are really good grower in the south Taylor Clem: they take full sun. Taylor Clem: and grow to maturity relatively quickly. They need Taylor Clem: sorry lost my lost my place there. They will produce all summer long. They’re not heavy feeders. Most beans don’t seem to be super heavy feeders. So these produce really well in the summer without much maintenance at all. Taylor Clem: Roselle is another one that is Taylor Clem: related to the viscous Taylor Clem: and it is Taylor Clem: in referred to as Florida cranberry. Taylor Clem: It is a a plant where you actually you harvest Taylor Clem: the callous of the flowers. So Taylor Clem: you you plant it, and you get a a big plant, and then when it starts to flower, you harvest the calluses Taylor Clem: it’ll grow 6 to 7 feet tall, and then in about the fall you harvest the caluses, and you can make anything you would make with cranberries out of it. You can make teas, chutneys, jams. Has a very similar flavor to cranberry. Just add your sugar and Taylor Clem: make something with it. Taylor Clem: So that is one that does really well here it’s a little kind of little known, but once you discover it, people seem to really like that. One Taylor Clem: cassava is another one that does well here. You can buy tubers and or by bury a 10 inch section of a stem to get that growing it’ll grow 12 plus feet Taylor Clem: and then you harvest it for the tuber. Taylor Clem: You want to plan it in. Taylor Clem: well drained soil. It’s a light feeder needs sun, and you harvest it just for the 2 bird. Use it like Taylor Clem: like any other root vegetable. Taylor Clem: So for our squash Taylor Clem: about the only ones that really thrive in the summer. Here we have the calabaza and the seminal pumpkins. Taylor Clem: they are very heat tolerant, and have exceptional insect and disease tolerance. You’d plant them in the summer for a fall harvest. Taylor Clem: and both of them. They have similar timing. Taylor Clem: I will say Taylor Clem: I have had nematode problems Taylor Clem: with the Seminole. Taylor Clem: That’s just my experience in a bed full of many different squash. They all went to the Seminole. Taylor Clem: but but they are known for very, being very prolific here. They love our, they love our our environment, and and produce out of control. Taylor Clem: So that that is a good one to plant here. If you want your squash. Taylor Clem: I know a lot of people will plant it and Taylor Clem: cause we can’t really grow pumpkins. And we can, you know. But Seminole swatch, yeah, the gift that keeps on giving compost in it’ll come back. So it’s like one of the plans like you plant the blonde so it’ll always come back soccer. But Taylor Clem: It’s great because we can harvest it like around like October November time. Taylor Clem: you know. Late season people turn them into like our version of like pumpkin pie. Great plant you can’t cook with you just can’t carve with it very well. So it’s a great like sort of variety version of a pumpkin. Some pumpkins grow well, but they just don’t like our heat, so the timing is late summer for typical pumpkins, because for, like a late season, part pumpkins are great. Taylor Clem: or but they just keep popping up. Well, I’m gonna try them again. But I’m think I’m gonna solarize my my dirt first, st because I swear every nematode in the whole thing went straight forth. Yeah, yeah, I keep hearing. They’re great. So Taylor Clem: okay, so hot weather herbs. Taylor Clem: so hot weather herbs. We’ve got all of our traditional ones. The Aro Reganov Rosemary time mince. Basil doesn’t do so. Well, here it’s it is kind of prone to some diseases. You’ll get the black spot on it. You get you’ll get some fungus problems on it once it really gets hot and humid in it. Around here. Taylor Clem: but there are some more interesting things you can grow here. There’s 1 called Cilantro, which is a real kind of similar to Cilantro. It’s a heat loving version of Cilantro, because Cilantro is a cold Taylor Clem: like a cold season. Herb kinda it. It apparently has a stronger but similar flavor to Cilantro. There’s ginger, which Taylor Clem: will grow in the shirt in the shade. Taylor Clem: and turmeric, which is very similar to ginger. It will also grow in the shade. Taylor Clem: So those are the crops Taylor Clem: that will really thrive will grow in the summer. Here some thrive, some grow Taylor Clem: so Taylor Clem: quickly, just talking about our soil. Most soils here are very sandy. Taylor Clem: And we know the ideal. Ph is 6.5. So it’s always a good idea to start with a soil test here. I know there’s a lot of alkaline soils in this region. Taylor Clem: And adding compost and manure to increase the fertility of our soil, especially when you’re trying to grow vegetables again. A lot of vegetables. We’re asking a lot of them. So giving them the best. Taylor Clem: The best that we can is is a good idea. Taylor Clem: seeds or transplants. Taylor Clem: It’s something to consider and how you’re planning on starting your garden. Seeds give you a good selection, and they’re inexpensive. However. Taylor Clem: once you get a seed catalog that can quickly change when you start seeing all the options. But there are so many options. If you do decide to go to start seeds, transplants. Taylor Clem: They give you an instant garden but they are expensive. And your selection is limited to what they have in the store. And you do have to be careful. I have noticed selections in stores sometimes. Don’t always match up with the region that you’re purchasing in so that’s something to be aware of. Taylor Clem: Watering the garden, something that you have to think about. Then garden will need one to 2 inches of water a week. You wanna make sure you’re watering in the morning and not splashing on the leaves. So using drip irrigation is Taylor Clem: always gonna be the best thing, and mulching is. Taylor Clem: I say, mulch, mulch, mulch mulching is always going to be very beneficial. Both to keep that. Keep that moisture from evaporating every afternoon. Taylor Clem: and to keep the water Taylor Clem: off of the plants. Taylor Clem: Disease is so much more prevalent during the summer, and will be even more so if you don’t follow these guidelines. Taylor Clem: And if your plant plants wilt excessively in the afternoon every afternoon, like Taylor Clem: stressed plants, are more susceptible to pests and disease. So you know, anything we can do to minimize that stress is going to help. Taylor Clem: you know, manage their their strength to combat those things Taylor Clem: she was hoping for a little explanation of mulch. Taylor Clem: Oh, mulch is something that we put on the surface of the soil to protect the soil from Taylor Clem: from Taylor Clem: evaporation of water weeds. It’s it’s a barrier between the soil and the elements. Yeah. Taylor Clem: So fertilizing the garden. Taylor Clem: we wanna make sure we fertilize the garden before we plant. We can do this. Just fertilize the whole area. And then we’re gonna want to Taylor Clem: do additional fertilizing every 3 weeks throughout the growing season. Just make sure that we keep up on that one thing to keep in mind. If you do use an organic fertilizer, like the the one shown in the picture. There it does take a few weeks for the microbes in the soil to break those down. Taylor Clem: so you either want to make sure you get that in the soil a few weeks ahead of planting. Taylor Clem: or make sure that you’re supplementing it with the liquid fertilizer. For the 1st several weeks Taylor Clem: until that has a chance to get going. So if you do it at the same time, just make sure you’re getting out there and doing your doing your spray or fertilizer? So they’re not just starving. Taylor Clem: starving as they wait for those microbes to do their job. Taylor Clem: Tomatoes and peppers in particular are really prone to blossom and rot. So we need to make sure that they are getting a good amount of calcium Taylor Clem: if you are using organic methods. Ball meal is a really good way of getting that to them, or polarized egg shell. Taylor Clem: So care in the garden in the summer. Taylor Clem: The Taylor Clem: pretty much big things you need to think about are scouting for insects. Taylor Clem: keeping an eye out for disease, protecting from invaders. Taylor Clem: harvest the crops, harvest the bulk of the crops, and then remove the plant. You don’t wanna leave a plant there as soon as it’s put out. You know the bulk of what it’s going to get the plant out of there. And don’t let an area go to weed. Once once you let let weeds take hold. Then they start putting their seeds in. You’re gonna be battling that for a long time and never let produce Taylor Clem: rot, never let produce fall on the ground. Never leave produce rotting on the plant. Don’t let that tomato slip by. You. Try not to let that tomato slip by you because rotting produce attracts more pests. Taylor Clem: So Taylor Clem: that’s not a good idea. If if you need to. You know, if your if your plants start to get crowded throughout the season. I have to do this. Sometimes I got things close together, go in and start pruning things to improve that air flow rather than rather than let you know Taylor Clem: rather than let the moisture and humidity get trapped in there and and start creating problems Taylor Clem: and Taylor Clem: any soil that’s not in use needs to be protected Taylor Clem: so quickly. Talking about pests. Taylor Clem: Got several of them right there. Taylor Clem: Those are the guys. Taylor Clem: Those are those are major guys that we gotta that. We gotta scout for Taylor Clem: man. The those leaf footed bugs and army worms are my major enemies. Taylor Clem: So strategies for making it through the summer Taylor Clem: just to quickly recap water early in the morning, but don’t get to leave sweat Taylor Clem: weed. Often we can control the pests with botanical sprays, but you don’t want to do it in the heat of the day. Taylor Clem: Use Taylor Clem: disease. Resistant varieties of plants, if possible. Taylor Clem: Use generous spacing to increase air, flow. Taylor Clem: fertilize regularly. Taylor Clem: You wanna plant lots of pollinator plants to keep the bees and beneficial insects. There. Taylor Clem: plant trap crops. We’ll talk about those in a second and good idea to practice crop rotation. Taylor Clem: Oh, really quickly. For pest control. Some good options. You mentioned botanical sprays. Things like meme oils just shooting with a hose. Using your fingers. Bt for the caterpillars or pyrethrum. Those are good options for managing pretty much all of your pests Taylor Clem: without going to Taylor Clem: extreme chemicals. But it is important to do those not in the afternoon of the day you might might scorch your plants. Taylor Clem: and then the crop rotation. Some pests and disease get target specific plants. So if you plant that same crop in the same spot over and over again. It’ll get comfy there, and you’ll get an abundance of that Taylor Clem: that disease or that pest in that spot Taylor Clem: have crops are plants that you grow that are more attractive to insects. For food and egg laying, so the harmful insects will be lured away from your vegetables because they want to go over there. Taylor Clem: So it’s a good idea to plant your trap props a few weeks ahead of the crops you’re trying to protect. Taylor Clem: Some examples of this are. You can plant a combination of sorghum. Sorghum sunflowers will lure leaf footed bugs away from tomatoes blue hovered squash will lure cucumber beetles, squash bugs, and squash find boars. Taylor Clem: truck crops are also a good tool for drawing in pollinators Taylor Clem: that are natural predators to pests, such as parasitic wasps. Taylor Clem: and hover flies. So it’s it’s good for luring away the bad and lowering in the the predators. Taylor Clem: To that guys. Taylor Clem: And last, I just wanna mention if you are determined to Taylor Clem: to grow more traditional summer crops. You can experiment with shade cloth. If you use shade cloth, you can actually extend Taylor Clem: a lot of Taylor Clem: what many of us think of as summer crops. But here is more spring and fall crops. If you utilize shape cloth over your garden. You can actually extend that spring into summer, and some of these crops will actually grow through the summer. So Taylor Clem: you can either. And I’ve done both of these methods. You can either use the black shade cloth of between 30 and 45% and put that up over your whole area. Or you can actually use row, cover fabric, and just drape that over your over your plants. Taylor Clem: with the shave clock, you know. You can actually stake it up over the whole area. With the row cover fabric, you can just drop it on your plants. One benefit of the row cover fabric is actually reflects the heat out as well. So it actually reduces, doesn’t just create shade. It actually will reduce the temperature a bit. And Taylor Clem: if you can see on the edges, you can actually Taylor Clem: blocks and insects as well. So you’re getting kind of a Taylor Clem: kind of a double whammy there. With that one you can Taylor Clem: kind of act like an insect barrier. So if you do that, you can actually experiment with growing some of your like, you know. Taylor Clem: cucumbers. Maybe some of your other squashes and and melons and things that Taylor Clem: would normally kind of Taylor Clem: struggle Taylor Clem: with the summer heat. Taylor Clem: So that wraps up Taylor Clem: nice slideshow. Taylor Clem: Do we have any questions. Taylor Clem: We’ve had a lot of questions coming through on here. So I’ve been trying to. You’ve been answering Taylor Clem: as a new morning. So we have a lot of great questions. So, yeah, is there any other questions? And I can review the online questions with everybody here in a few minutes. But we can Taylor Clem: great presentation? Taylor Clem: So you talked about planning things that track pollinators and also using like the oil and things like that. So my question is, how do you get the most benefit of using something like that? But it’s necessary without harming the pollinators. So pollinators are attracted to the plants. You know all the plants that are living. Taylor Clem: regardless of whether or not they’re vegetable or having insect issues so Taylor Clem: unbalanced side Taylor Clem: any insecticide. I’m gonna do. I’m on our butterflies, and I’m attracting to the doctor I was on a spread of. Taylor Clem: can you display that question? Oh, well, Taylor Clem: Kelly, yeah, Kelly’s asking how you how you manage like you have your pollinator plants drawing in your your pollinators, but then you have some pests that you need to treat with like your name oil. How do you do that without killing off your pollinators as well? Did I restate that correctly? Okay. Taylor Clem: do you even answer that one second? Yeah, can you answer that one? So Taylor Clem: so I mean, that’s a great question. We get the question all the time. Taylor Clem: So we did have the question online, also that or as a statement, is like Nemoil, and like other horticultural oils, horticultural soaps, even though they’re not like your typical, like pyrethroids or other insecticides or pesticides, they can still impact non target species. So the things you don’t want to kill. So there’s a couple of strategies that we can do so, for, like Nemoil, or anything like that, be very specific in your targeted application. Taylor Clem: some of the big issues is just blanket applications on plant material. That’s not good spot treatment only. So if you have aphids or some other insect, you’re trying to control spray only where they’re active. Taylor Clem: And luckily a lot of times with like memorials or soaps, they break down very quickly, and the residual doesn’t last very long. But then, also we think about foraging. Taylor Clem: So there are prime times of the day where our pollinators are foraging, and when you actually look at the labels, they’ll actually tell you avoid. Avoid applying this product. Eat while insects are foraging. Taylor Clem: so like your bees, your butterflies, etc. So which is during the day. So usually, if you follow the temperature restrictions on a lot of those applications and just say, don’t apply when temperatures are above 84 degrees, and we get there at like 7 o’clock in the morning. So if you, as long as you’re applying in the morning, and you’re applying in that lower temperatures in the mornings or in the late evening when foraging has ceased pretty much. Taylor Clem: you’re gonna minimize the impacts to the beneficials. So timing is very critical. So really think about spot treatment only as well as just the timing of the application cause. Yeah, you are right. It’s like Nemoil is great horticultural, horticultural horticultural soaps are wonderful, but they’re still insecticides. So you still need to make sure that you’re very aware of how you’re using them. Taylor Clem: you know. So treat them no different than it is a pyrethroid you just, or I don’t want to say pyrethroid, but, like any other type of pesticide. But just treat it Taylor Clem: in a safe manner and follow the restrictions. The label is long. You should be okay. But forging and timing is gonna be the biggest thing. I’m just Taylor Clem: spot treatment only because meanwhile horticultural horticulture. Subs. They don’t work unless you get direct contact. Taylor Clem: Really. So it’s gonna be important to just it’s not gonna be worth it to spray other parts of the plant, because that’s when you can hit non-target species. Taylor Clem: Focus on where those targeted species are. Is it okay to do those in the evening like you don’t water your plants in the evenings. You don’t want to breathe fungus on us. Yeah, it should be totally fine to spray out in the evening, cause I, when you’re putting down the like those sprays, I would be too concerned about moisture levels leading to a Fung fungal pathogen, because just wet over evening, because it’s just a small amount. Taylor Clem: So that’s a great question. So you made that. But it also also bring, depending on how you’re irrigating or watering. If it’s drip, it’s not much of a concern. But also Taylor Clem: sorry if it’s driven. It’s not too much of a concern, but you don’t wanna like. Put down a pest aside, and then you, if you have like a spray head or something like that, that’s watering your vegetable, don’t have it. Turn on right afterwards, because that almost defeats the purpose, and it’s a waste Taylor Clem: and as well as with the mulch that just brought up a good thought with the mulch. It’s a great idea for gardens, but for some of our younger plants you need to be very careful. You don’t want the mulch right up on the plant base because it could rock the base of the plant. You can create an environment that creates a fungus. Taylor Clem: So just making sure, like the most can be very beneficial. But just be very strategic in how you’re using it. So Taylor Clem: always important with mulch. Keep it away from the stems. Yes, yes, baby vegetables are very baby plants are very susceptible to that. Stems are toothpicks. Taylor Clem: Any other questions. Taylor Clem: Great job. Okay, wonderful. Thanks, Bobby. Taylor Clem: Alright. So thank you all so much for joining us today? We will follow up with some of the information and the recording of the program. So I do appreciate everyone joining us online, and everybody that’s here in person. So you all, I can’t put my mouse. You all have a wonderful day Taylor Clem: weekend coming up. It’s hot. Hopefully, we get some rain. We need it so anyways, you all take care and have a great day. Thank you all so much.