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North Mississippi Gardening Tips
July/August, 2004

FLOWERS

By this time of year it is so hot and dry that some of us spend more time enjoying our flower gardens by looking out the windows of our air conditioned homes rather than actually going outdoors. If this describes you, all you have to do is make sure you take care of the garden problems that can be seen from your window seat! I hate to admit it but I tend to fall in this category. If I can't see the problem from a distance I figure it can't be too bad and will maybe go away eventually if I ignore it. For those more persnickety gardeners, the following paragraphs will guide you in what you should be doing now in your flower garden.

You can still plant annual, perennial and biennials. Prepare the soil thoroughly and don't forget to water these new plants well as the season progresses. You can cut back the bearded irises now if the ugly, yellowing foliage bothers you. You can lift and separate the rhizomes at this time also. Continue to deadhead spent flowers to keep the garden looking neat and to encourage new blooms to form. Don't forget to water if it hasn't rained in a week and keep a close eye on the bug and diseases, treating with pesticides when appropriate. Keep the floppy flowers staked and don't forget to wave at your neighbor and me as we admire your industriousness and dedication from my perch on the window seat!

TREES AND SHRUBS

Now is not the time to prune any of the spring-blooming shrubs or trees. By this time flower buds have already formed for next spring and any pruning you do will remove these buds. It is best not to prune summer-flowering shrubs like althea and butterfly bush in the summer unless absolutely necessary. Better to wait until next winter when the plants are dormant. You can take semi-hardwood cuttings of shrubs like azalea, camellia and hydrangea during July and August. Root them in a peat/sand or peat/perlite rooting bed in a shady location. Mist them frequently to keep them from drying out.

GROUNDCOVERS AND LAWNS

By this time, lawns are looking pretty sad especially if you don't irrigate. It's hot and dry and it seems that all that is thriving in this situation are the weeds. In late summer many weeds are going to seed, so it is important to keep the lawn cut to keep these seed heads from forming. If you run off to the cool mountains for a week long vacation, hire a neighbor kid to come and mow your lawn for you. That is money better spent than on herbicides to control a zillion newly sprouted weed! This also has other benefits. You will be doing your neighbors a favor by helping them keep junior off the road and out of trouble, which will result in a cleaner environment in more ways than one!

CONTAINER PLANTS

During the late summer, it is easy to let parts of our yard succumb to the heat and dry weather. One way to maintain that lush, green look around your patio, deck, porch or entrance is by using containers overflowing with colorful, healthy plants. Limiting your efforts to the small task of keeping these containers watered, fertilized and maintained is easier than trying to keep up the whole yard. When placed in strategic locations around the landscape these planters can have a real impact. Some garden centers specialize in designing and planting these container gardens. Learn from their expertise and you can create your own designs using plants purchased from the garden center. Remember to use plants of different colors, shapes and textures to create your masterpiece! Using large pots can cut down on the frequency of watering. Grouping pots of different sizes and shapes together is a trick used by the professionals, too. Odd numbers are said to be more pleasing than even numbers of pots when creating these groups.

VEGETABLES

Late summer is harvest time in the vegetable garden. Keep up with the harvest by picking any vegetables that are ready, frequently. Keep harvested vegetables refrigerated if you cannot process them immediately. Continue to train and support tomatoes, cucumbers, pole beans and peppers on a regular basis. Be particularly careful when harvesting bell peppers, as it is easy to break the branches. Using a pair of scissors or clippers is the best way to harvest bell peppers rather than trying to snap off the fruit with our hands. As some vegetables quit producing you need to remove them from the garden. Work bare areas and plant a cover crop of winter peas or crimson clover. Watch your tomatoes for the tomato hornworm, at the first sign of damage spray with BT (Bacillus thurinigiensis). Cracking of tomato fruit is generally caused by uneven watering, whether it is from rain or irrigation. If this occurs, use a soaker hose and let the water run for several hours. Removing the suckers from the axils of the leaves of your tomato plants will reduce the number of fruit, but the remaining fruit will be larger. So the choice to remove suckers or not is up to you and whether you want fewer but larger fruit, or more but smaller fruit.

Lelia Scott Kelly, Ph.D., writes North Mississippi Gardening Tips monthly and is a Horticulture Specialist with the Mississippi State University Extension Service. Her office is in the North Mississippi Research & Extension Center, Verona.