Perhaps you’ve noticed it’s been a tad warm out lately. At least if you’re… well… just about anywhere in the US!
It’s almost 100 degrees in the shade!
Well, I messed up. In my post about plants reseeding themselves I have a photo of scads of little turnips germinating in a backyard garden bed. It had been less than 48 hours since I had watered when I noticed the beans drooping. Uh oh, I thought to myself. This isn’t going to be good… So I went out to check on things. Much to my dismay, all the carrots were completely toast. And most of the beets, turnips and radishes were having a near-death experience. The cukes weren’t looking so great either with at least two going to the big compost heap in the sky. I quickly got the hose, watered thoroughly and hoped for the best.
You can compare the other day (left) to yesterday (right)… You can see lots of the turnip seedlings from the other day. And in amongst them to the right of the beans were (yes, past tense…) a few rows of my beet seedlings. I let one day go by and didn’t check on them. I know better, but got busy with other things around the house that day. So less than 48 hours later, the same area looks like the right. Beans were suffering, but salvageable. But self-seeded turnips and my rows of beets were history.
Young turnips germinating among the beans
Beans hanging on, turnips meeting their maker from heat
Radishes dying from heat
Tokyo Market turnips rebounding after a good soaking