The weather has been hot, hot without rain.  So far we are over seven and a half inches below normal for the year.  Three weekends ago, the weather folks predicted two to four inches of rain, only they forgot to inform Mother Nature of it.  

The Gulf coast received around 18 inches that weekend and is getting drenched again this week.  I’ve been watering from the time I come home from work until dark each day.  Cotton loves this weather, but the corn crop is tassling out and needs rain.  No rain is predicted for the next week and most of the corn crop will be lost unless irrigation is being used.

Time not watering is spent hauling wood chips from the utility company and mulching.  I finally got my heirloom tomatoes out in the garden and gave away the excess. I kept waiting for the ninety degree temps to moderate, but it was past time to have them in the ground as they were over two feet tall.   I dug a deep hole, and place water retention crystals derived from a plant source in the bottom of the hole and sprinkled some Epsom salts and fertilizer and back filled to a level an inch below the surrounding soil.  I have more of the Cherokee Purple tomatoes this year.  They seemed to be a favorite of my give aways.   Before mulching I put newspaper down around my plants and mulched heavily.  The tomatoes responded by doubling in size and putting out some nice tomatoes.  I received similar results after mulching my squash plants.  This weekend I plan to finish mulching. And no I didn’t  use a string line to mark off my rows.  After one day in the lower nineties, temperatures will be back in the hundreds.  Some of my re-blooming iris which normally bloom in September to October are blooming early this year.  Some of my daylilies are in re-bloom and some of the later bloomers are just starting.

Around here, a successful garden bragging rights is measured by when and how many tomatoes you receive in your first picking.  I over wintered two tomato plants in the garage this past winter expecting to have the bragging rights for the first tomato.   They had come up in some compost containing potting soil I had made up.  After planting them in the garden and they started to set fruit, I realized that they were these rather large tasteless salad tomatoes that were supposed to be Brandywine seeds last year.  I pulled the plants up and tossed them into the compost pile.

After our last rain I planted a row of peaches and cream corn.  I haven’t run a water line down to my new garden area yet, and the corn was looking bedraggled.  I filled the loader on the JD with water, drove down to the garden and pour a good dose down the row.

The Japanese beetles are just about under control.  I’ve capture over 15 gallons of the little varmints in my traps.  I had to empty the traps daily of the beetles into zip lock bags , sealing and placing in a recycled sink I have in the garden until all of the beetles died.  Dying Japanese beetles stink like a dead corpse. Some time during the night, either the hooligans or coyotes pulled the bags out of the sink and ripped the bags to shreds.  I had trouble getting to my greenhouse due to the odor.  The hooligans rolled in the bugs and besides being very stinky, had dead beetles matted in their hair.

This is the time of year is the beginning of the festivals.   Usually we have an unusual heat wave during the festival time. This year is no exception.  The Helen Keller Festival was this past weekend and temperatures were in the hundreds all weekend.   These young folks who spend too much time playing video games aren’t used to being outside in the heat as a number were hauled off to the hospital.  I was a volunteer photographer and spent Friday afternoon and all day Saturday walking around town visiting the car show around the courthouse, the Tuscumbia depot, and down town.  Down in Spring Park, vendors were set up and various bands played on stage.  Since I was one of the photographers, I got to take pictures behind the scenes before and while the bands were playing.   The Alabama Blue Brothers, The Spring and Diamond Rio were some of the bands on stage Saturday evening.

Next up is the W C Handy Festival Shoals wide from July 20 to July 29.    September 7 and 8 is the Oka Kapassa, Return to Coldwater, a special Native American gathering. 

I just about gave up on a vegetable garden this year.  My watermelons, cucumbers and cantaloupes either drowned after four inches of rain or died in the drought that followed.  Rain was forecasted several times, but went around my area.  A storm was forecasted again for Sunday night, and my tomato plants needed to get out of the greenhouse and into the ground.

I got the John Deere out and plowed up the garden and planted twenty-three tomato plants.  I grew my favorite Cherokee purple again this year, along with a Black Russian and German Pink Belgium, two new varieties I haven’t planted before.  I decided to give Mortgage Lifter another chance this year.  Last year hot spring and summer was a disaster for any tomato.

I dig a hole about a food deep and throw the soil off to the side. Before putting the tomatoes in the hole, I add Epsom salt, a time released fertilizer and an plant derived water retention crystal.  With the drought we’ve had, I don’t need to water as often.   After pinching off any leaves that would be below the ground and placing in the hole, I fill the hole from around the top until it is about an inch below the level of the ground.  That way water will stay around the plant and not run off.  I should have plenty of tomatoes for sharing.  Now I need to free up some of my hooligan cages protecting shrubs around the house for the tomatoes; put newspaper down and mulch.  I have two cages around small fig trees trying to grow back out after being mowed down. We won’t mention who did that.

My daylilies have been in full bloom and at their peak.

Before the 1.98 inches of rain, I also got scalloped and crookneck squash and cantaloupes replanted.   The spot where I decided to till around a bald cypress and knocked my cup of seeds out of my cup holder on the tractor fender has a real nice stand of squash.  They are a little too close together though.

While working around the garden, I noticed that the Japanese beetles were starting to make their presence known and put traps on my shopping list.  They love crepe myrtles, hibiscus, roses, dahlias, plums and the leaves of plum trees and will quickly devour a plant.   When using the traps, you need to place them away from what you are trying to protect or otherwise they will have a feast. I usually use milky spore each year, but didn't last year with my knee injury and lack of rain.  I can tell the difference this year, as the number of beetles has increased dramatically.

I unpacked the traps for assembly on the back tail gate of my truck.  It’s just the right height and makes a good table.  I also use the scoop on my tractor loader a lot as a potting bench.  When I opened one of the sex lure attractants, it popped out and I made the mistake of picking it up with my bare hands.   Beetles were coming and swarming around me even after hanging up the trap. I rinsed off my hands and I still had the little boogers chasing after me.  Finally I went into the house and gave my hands a good soap scrubbing.

I must have dropped the box with the extra bags that came in each kit into my recycling box, as I can’t find them.  The three traps have been filling up each day with about three quarts of beetles.  The refill bags cost almost as much as the trap kit.  I started emptying the bags into a gallon zip locks bags sealing up for disposal, and hanging the bag back up for reuse.  Three quarts of Japanese beetles are rank, so you need to hold your breath during this part if you are a tight wade like me.

Since the hooligan were shot, Patches and Levi are terrified of storms and want to be near me. Sunday night I left the house garage door cracked and they hid under and in front of my truck.  The next night, we had a little lightening during the night.  We didn’t get any rain, but must have gotten some thunder as Patches chewed up the trim around the garage doors trying to get in.  An earlier storm she went through the screen door on the screen porch. I heard someone rattling the door knob, only to find Patches with the knob in her mouth trying to open the door.  When I first got her she would turn the outside faucets on to get a drink of water and walk off leaving the water running. I finally had to take the handles off of them.