Cool Spring Weather Chills Coastal Gardens
Written by Maria Gaura
SANTA CRUZ (May 2010) - Dear fellow vegetable gardeners- it’s not your imagination. May, our traditional planting season here on the coast, really has been unusually chilly, damp and yucky.
Our pain has been confirmed by the National Weather Service in Monterey, where, if it makes you feel better, the weather has been even worse than it is here in Santa Cruz “It’s true, it has been colder than usual,” said NWS Forecaster and Monterey resident Steve Anderson. “Some of our records date back to the late 1800s, and this is probably one of the top ten coolest Mays on record.”
After years of drought conditions, it would be surly to complain about the lingering showers filling our reservoirs and keeping our lawns lush and green. But those tomatoes you optimistically planted in April are probably sulking, if they haven’t keeled over entirely, and that basil … where did it go? Nothing but a few nibbled stems and a slime trail at the crime scene.
Late May is pushing the envelope for getting a summer garden in the ground, but there are a few things you can do to help salvage what is shaping up to be a late, cool growing season.
THRIVE, OR ELSE ...
For one, this might be a good time to cast aside your tender feelings and coolly evaluate whether the plants in your garden have any chance of thriving in the coming weeks, or maturing before fall arrives.
Are your tomato plants yellowed and scrawny? Have they produced some scraggly blossoms on thin stems? You may be better off yanking them out and replacing them with healthy starts of short-season varieties such as Early Girl, Juliet, Cosoluto Genovese or pretty much any cherry tomato.
Are your cucumbers, basil, pole beans or other heat-loving veggies looking wan and miserable? If the warm weather predicted for Memorial Day weekend doesn’t perk them up, I’d relocate them into the compost bin, and start over.
But be choosy about your replacements! Due to slow sales and crummy weather, nursery shelves are currently loaded with past-their-prime vegetable starts that are best avoided. Don’t buy a tomato start – or any vegetable plant - that has flowers or fruit on it. Keep searching until you find a fresh young plant sprouting nothing but lush green leaves.
I’m not shilling for the garden center, and yes, I’m sorry about the $2 to $4 you may have spent on each of those suffering seedlings. But you can’t argue with Mother Nature, and if you wait too long to re-plant, you may find yourself searching the Internet for green-tomato recipes come September.
FOLLOW THE SUN
Step two – follow the sun! Figure out which parts of your garden get the most sun and warmth, and put the heat-loving plants there. The base of a south-facing wall is ideal. Mulch the soil to keep it warm and moist. Short-season tomatoes can thrive even in our foggy summers if the soil stays nice and warm.
Step three – don’t crowd your garden beds. Plant diseases thrive in damp weather and crowded conditions, so make sure there’s room for air flow between the leaves. Also, avoid overhead watering, which encourages mold and blight.
And finally, unless you’re up in the hills and far from the ocean, forget about beefsteak tomatoes, and most melons, eggplant or peppers. These super-heat lovers thrive in triple-digit Central Valley climes, and will produce miserably, if at all, in our summer fog.
Instead, try cool-tolerant veggies like lettuce, snap peas, bunching onions, carrots, chard, potatoes, parsley and strawberries, which do well in our coastal zone practically year-round. Sunflowers are also reliable performers in Santa Cruz gardens.
In better years, I've been known to plant my tomatoes as early as April. But this year I held off till the last week of May, and didn’t bother with any finicky heirlooms, sad to say. The first planting of basil has failed to thrive, and there’s a patch of shivering pole beans that may be headed for the compost bin this weekend.
BEAUTY AND AGGRAVATION
But this rainy spring has brought as much beauty as aggravation. My dahlias are waist-high and incredibly lush, the avocado is covered with huge, glossy leaves, and the salamanders are still scampering about in the moist undergrowth. Also, snap peas! We’ve had them for months! And we’re only a little sick of them.
Anyway, there’s a possibility that our current cool weather may be on its way out.
According to Anderson, the long-term forecast for summer 2010 in the Monterey Bay area calls for “near-normal” temperatures through June, July and August, and the rain currently falling (as of May 27) is the last shower expected for the coming weeks.
“We expect temperatures to warm up a little bit by Friday and over the (Memorial Day) weekend,” Anderson said. “Then we see a nice warming trend. Things should be back to normal by next week.”
Set as favorite
Bookmark
Email this
Trackback(0)
TrackBack URI for this entryComments
(0)
Subscribe to this comment's feed