| For the first several months, my garden had no problems. All the plants thrived and no pests appeared. My only complaint was the slow growth of the plants. Was my soil to blame? Or do seed packets routinely lie about how quickly the plants grow to maturity? As it turns out, the problem was winter. Specifically, it was the short day length during winter. With less sunlight each day, the plants grew slower. But still they grew, with no pests or other problems.
Then a few days ago, I went out to check on my lettuce. I had just planted a few lettuce plants and, to my surprise, they were gone. I looked closer and then found them. They were dead. In fact, they were positively crispy. It looked as though they'd been fried. What had I done wrong? I'd been so careful! Was the soil the problem? I don't think I forgot to water them. And then another gardener mentioned the few hot days we'd had recently. That was it! We had a few unseasonably warm days - just a few - and that's all it took to kill my lettuce.
In fact, all of my cool weather crops are having trouble. Some of the brassica plants got infested with aphids. Some of the pole peas began to flower early. So did some of the favas (which - despite their efforts to reproduce quickly before they died - were droopy and near death). I sprayed the aphids off my cabbage with water, but I tossed a few of the infested plants into the compost bin, since they were too small to realistically produce much before the weather warms up anyway. I also composted the favas, and I might do so with the peas as well (we'll see). As for the rest of the cool weather plants, I've been watering them at mid-day so they are cooled as the water evaporates.
In the meantime, my warm weather plants are loving the warm weather. The next 3 days will be close to 80, and then the weather will go back down into the high 60s again (and we might even get some rain). Today I went outside and killed my cover crop (purple vetch) in an area of the garden and then mixed it in with the soil along with some sand. We've got clay soil, which forms a hard cap on the surface, so hopefully the sand will prevent that from occurring. In that patch, I set up a trellis and then planted beans (pole and bush) and 4 types of cucumbers - pickling, slicing, Persian, and Armenian. I also planted a few nasturtiums and a watermelon.
I realize that my problems are all weather-related but it's taking a toll on my ego as my poor little plants wither up and die! |
