Here in Texas, at least in Dallas, there is a dead zone in the year, a time of year when it is too hot and too dry for just about any but the hardiest native plants to grow or produce. But, with the first hint of fall, the morning glories that grow like weeds in the alleys start to bloom, and I know it’s time for that wonderful time of year, the Second Season!
Follw me below the fold, and let me tell you more about the second season.
Tomatoes that produce well through early summer may produce some blooms in late summer, but it is harder for them to set fruit when the night time temperatures start to hover around the eighties. Some varieties (such as the ones I got this year) curl their leaves in disgust and just stop growing, sulking until the temperatures suit their needs. So when the temperatures start to fall to the mid-nineties during the day, and get down to the low to mid seventies at night, I start side-dressing with the compost that has been cooking all summer long. So far, so good – my slicing tomatoes are putting out blooms again like crazy!
The bell pepper plant has likewise been sulking. I should have known better than to get a variety with “California” in the name – this diva of a pepper plant refuses to act like its low-class scary brown chili Mexican cousins, the jalapenos and serranos that have been merrily soaking up the heat and making hot little babies all summer long!
In a leap of faith, I have planted several different kinds of lettuces in the shade of the pepper plants. I used a trick I learned from Organic Gardening magazine about planting teeny little seeds. I get single-ply, unbleached toilet paper and pull off a section as long as the bed or row, lay the seeds in the middle of the toilet paper strip, and then fold the edges over the seeds. I then roll up the strip of toilet paper, take it out to the garden, unroll the strip in the row I have dug for it, cover it with dirt, water well, and wait. I have used this toilet paper method with great success with other small-seeded plants like carrots and mustard. It makes it easier for me to space out the seeds – I prepare the toilet paper roll on the kitchen counter and it saves my stiff old back.
Speaking of mustard, the second season brings out the best of my mustard plants that have been self-seeding in my east bed for literally the last decade! They get a wimpy crop in the summertime, but these wimpy plants produce enough seed for a bountiful crop of beautiful mustard plants, with their piquant, purple-green leaves that will produce yummy greens all winter long – and then bolt beautifully come Spring, just in time to re-seed for the wimpy summer season…which will re-seed for fall…and on and on.
Ain’t the seasons great? Do you have a second season where you live? What do you grow then?
Tags: Gardening, seasonal foods
4 Comments
What a terrific idea on the toilet paper! I have mustard seeds to plant and will definitely try that. Those seeds are tiny.
I’m planning on Swiss chard, too. have fallen in love with that stuff this summer, and it apparently is much more heat tolerant than spinach.
My French sorrel is surviving. Not going great guns, but hey, it’s still green. I hope it will do better when the weather cools off a bit.
Did you ever try the Heat Wave variety of tomato? I bought some seeds last year, the second really hot summer in a row, but this year I didn’t get a garden in at all. They are supposed to set fruit up to 100 degrees — but with my luck they might taste like sodden baseballs.
In the past, I have had success with “Celebrity”, “Carnival” and “Merced” tomatoes in the heat – but these were not available at the nursery when I got well enough to garden.
I have not seen “Heat Wave”, but I’ll keep an eye out for it. I did an Internet search for “heat-tolerant tomatoes” and found a specieals called “Sunbeam” that supposedly loves the heat as well, so I ordered some seeds, which I will try come Spring.
I love chard! I had some “Rainbow Lights” in the east bed that grew and grew for years, until I got too sick to tend that bed, so the mustard took over the chard…who woulda thunk that mustard could be an invasive?
I’m going to try chard again – maybe even getting some “Rainbow” as a ornamental plant in my perennial border…chard is so versatile!
Oh oh, mustard! Thank you for the reminder – I’ve been meaning to plant it, but have kept forgetting.
Somewhere in the past, I heard about this toilet paper planting method from people who’d done it – and they loved it. I think it’s time for me to put it in my toolbox of gardening tricks that I have got to try.
Thanks for your post, drchelo. Here in Oklahoma we do have seasons, and mustard is one of my favorites. To get it to continue to grow through what can be tough winters, I’ve had the best luck with a planter on the south side of my house. It does re-seed very well. For some reason the soil here does not seem to care much for spinach or peppers, I have better luck with planters. Tomatoes do well, but suffer in the summer. I’ll try some of the hot weather varieties. Okra is a wonderful crop here, it loves hot weather, is very hardy, and makes very good pickled okra, soups and gumbos. Okra is by far my most successful plant here, although I do have good supply of jalepenos. And thanks for the toilet paper tip for planting small seeds.
You must be logged in to post a comment.