Summers like these have to end sometime.
May I present our forecast for the next five days:
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Friends to the south, like Zanthan Gardens and My Corner Of Katy in Texas, have been battling bad temps for two months. We now get to join them.
People aren’t the only ones feeling the heat. The Phlox paniculata on the left is one stressed out plant. (Please click on the photos to see them in a larger format.) See how the leaves are drooping? They are supposed to stand straight out like the phlox on the right. These photos were taken in two different areas of the garden this morning. Guess which one I’m watering today?
I water nearly everything at the Red Dirt Hacienda with soaker hoses. They are cheap and efficient unless you cut them with a weedeater. That reduces their efficiency by about 100%.
I keep hoping for a fancy watering system. The last quote we received was a whopping $5,600.00. We are the process of getting other quotes. In the meantime, I use a complicated personal five zone system with many y-connectors like the one above, and I’m the only one who understands it. I water one zone a day for less stress on the well. When the soaker hoses split from age or weedeater attack, I splice them with a repair kit. Some of the hoses are really old, so they often split. I don’t want to buy more, but I believe an investment needs to be made for replacement and to add them to the tiered gardens. That will make six zones.
The garden facing the street (where the stressed out phlox is) doesn’t get as much attention or water. My excuse? Out of sight, out of mind.
I must also remember to water all of my pots. Pam from Digging has the right idea. She only plants drought resistant sedums and agaves in her pots. Unfortunately, our colder winter and spring temps would probably kill them. Next summer, I might try it anyway.
In between running children to and fro, I’ll be outside, floppy garden hat firmly in place, battling the heat and sunshine. Where will you be today?
That sounds like quite a system you have set up. Do you have to water like that every year? Here, most of our summers call for occasional watering, and only occasionally do we have a year with a drought, like last year. I would be afraid that as soon as I had a professionally installed watering system, I’d want to change all the flower beds around.
Carol, May Dreams Gardenss last blog post..When A Gardener Goes to the Movies
Dee, as unhappy as I’ve been with the weather here on MCOK, my trials and tribulations pale in comparison to those of the Austin area bloggers. It really hit home for me when we were up in the Hill Country at the end of June. Things weren’t just languishing as they are here … they were dead.
We had a very nice respite from the heat and drought the last couple of days, thanks to Dolly. It’s back to business as usual today. I hope some remnants of rain make it to you Red Dirt folks.
Here in Southeast Texas, we are hoping for the best from Dolly, and hoping for our neighbors to the south that she doesn’t do too much damage when she comes ashore. Meantime, yes, the grass is brown and crunchy and the temperatures at mid-day are unbearable, but there is a lot of beauty in this season, too. I’m determined to concentrate on that. Life is too short to spend it complaining about the weather.
Dorothys last blog post..Obama visits Israel’s Holoclaust memorial
I’m ready to throw in the trowel for this year. I told myself I was going to mulch and water and stick it out this summer. But we’ve already had 3 times the normal number triple-digit days and we still have the rest of July and August to bear. So I’ll be reevaluating what gets to stay and what is going yet again.
Hope to get some rain up here out of Dolly. Looks like it will flood the valley with 15 inches but we’ve been told Austin will be lucky if we get half an inch.
mss @ Zanthan Gardenss last blog post..Austin Pond Tour 2008 Day 2
How many soaker hoses to you have altogether? I will have 3 and one my husband used an old
regular hose piece to connect the last one because it crosses the walk in front of the door. I have
to attach that one yet. Mine were pretty cheap, so I’m afraid to leave them out for the winter.
We had an inside day because I’m a wimp. We did get rain in our area but it missed us– I am
not joking–you could see it on the radar-big spot where we are– no rain. Grrrrr…
Brenda’s last blog post..More Giddiness in the Garden
Gosh, Brenda, I don’t know. Probably 10 or 12, maybe more. That’s why there are so many zones. Some are doubles to reach the ends of beds. Tomorrow, I’ll water the lower beds where the tomatoes are. We are supposed to be at 100 degrees tomorrow too, so I’ll go out early. We get that rain on the radar, but no real rain too.~~Dee
Can you leave the soakers in place all year? We try to bury them a bit…protects them from the sun and they last longer but you’d want to be able to leave them…not dig them up each year. I hope you and your plants get a break soon!
Yes, Leslie, I do leave them in all and bury them a little. Part of the problem, which I forgot to mention, is my hard water. It is hard on the hoses. Thanks for reminding me.~~Dee
Your poor stressed out phlox. It takes a lot to stress phlox like that. We are just now going into our summer heat and stress
period too. It has rained all around us the past couple of days and we are having the 90’s and 100 temps. UGH…
Today I got outside before it got too hot and did some deadheading and watering. My DB helped with a big project I will blog ab out. I drag a hose around to water. If my garden was any larger I would have to do like you and have soakers with zones etc. As it is our front garden doesn’t get watered much. It is the only full sun we have and I can’t be in the sun too much. I have allergic reactions to being in the sun.
Hi Lisa, you have been working hard today. Not me. I’ve just been dragging hoses around. Sorry about the allergic reactions to the sun.~~Dee
I’ve been hiding from the heat since I’ve been back in town, Dee. Lots of movies!
I can’t even express how much I want rain. The town is brown, and I worry that the city will lose a lot of trees if this extended drought goes on. I don’t really even care about the heat wave now (over a month of 100+ days, and today it’s 101) so much as the lack of rain. We’re hoping for a little relief tomorrow or Thursday from Dolly coming ashore along the Texas coast.
I know it’s tough everywhere, so you hang in there too!
Hi Pam, lots of movies and lots of posts. You’ve been working overtime on your blog since your return. I’ve really enjoyed the insight in the places you saw on your vacation. Stay cool.~~Dee
Running through the garden trying to escape the mosquitoes! We’re having a good summer if you like rain & cooler temperatures. I highly second Pam’s recommendation for succulents in containers. I put Sempervivum & a Sedum in my sole clay pot each summer, then return them to the garden for fall & winter. This has worked very well & the plants now need to be divided before going in the pot.
MMD, stay away from the mosquitoes, girl. On the summers that are wet, we have them really bad, but not this year.~~Dee
Sitting in here watching animals so they don’t get let out by workmen. That’s been me for a few weeks now. But I don’t want to trade places with you on this watering thing! Honey, you need a water system fast! My daughter built out in the country, and didn’t put in a sprinkling system, and I told her not to plant until she gets one (Tulsa area). Cause she’s already wasted so much money on plants. I don’t know how much land you have. But I KNOW you don’t have time to do what you just said you’re having to do! I feel for ya! I’d come help ya if I was closer!
Brenda
Thanks Brenda. You sure know which plants are the hardiest that’s for sure. HH is supposed to call another company about it today. I really hope he does.~~Dee
Oh no, that kind of heat is just gross. And I thought it was bad here lately! I’ve got a slowly growing network of soaker hoses as well, which will soon have the addition of a hose from the rainbarrel (waaay up on a slope so we should get some good water pressure). I hate to think how complicated this could become as I add more beds!
Amy, it can get very complicated. Hope yours works better than mine. I went to the store and when I returned, one of the spliced hoses had come apart. Water was running down the hill. I could have cried.~~Dee