July: Second Season Success

A problem

is a chance

for you to do your best.

~Duke Ellington

The vegetable garden in July is “payday” for all of our hard work. The temperatures are hot, the soil is warm and the plants are lush with abundant fruit. In my garden crops of carrots, potatoes, beans and beets have been producing for a bit and are beginning to wind down. Others like tomatoes and peppers are just starting to ripen. In between the harvests of those vegetables there are a few others that have not performed well for various reasons; weather, insects, disease and critters. If your garden (like mine) has suffered a few setbacks, July is a good time to adjust!

Of course you won’t start tomatoes in July and see a harvest if you live in my zone 5/6 area, but there are several seeds you can sow that will delight you with harvest in fall and perhaps make up for the disappointment of any crop failures. Why leave valuable growing space empty when you can harvest from it again in September?! Lettuce bolted? Summer squash mildewed? Beans through producing? Remove those spent crops and compost. (Never compost diseased plants.) Prepare the beds with new additions of compost and rake smooth. Seeds for beets, fennel, carrots, cauliflower (yes!), beans, kale, turnips, lettuces, summer squash, radishes and greens can all be direct-sowed into the garden this month with successful harvests in September and beyond. A few, like the summer squash may not produce as prolifically in the shorter daylight and cooler evening temperatures of late summer, but after the daily harvests of other crops in July and August slower is kind of nice.

Go ahead… pull up the veggies that are finished or failing and renew your growing space. Just because it’s summer doesn’t mean the season is ending! A few things to remember when sowing fall seeds:

• Seeds need moisture to germinate. Sowing the seeds a bit deeper than normal keeps them from drying out in the hot topsoil layer.
• A light mulch of grass over the entire seedbed allows the soil to remain cooler and moist for germination.
• A row cover will prevent hungry birds and critters from snatching your seeds and seedlings as they forage in the garden.

Happy gardening!

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