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Continued hot and dry. 99 degrees yesterday and sunny!! We had that one rain and then no more. Now we are on a cooling trend. 97 today and a couple degrees cooler each day until high predicted Sunday 85. Starting Wed, chance of afternoon thunder showers each day, but looks like no noticeable amount of rain until Friday. After Sun, temps start back up. But that is the 25th of August, so we are already past the worst of summer. That is when the historic average daily high temperature finally starts going down after sitting at 90 degrees all through July and the first weeks of Aug. ... I've still been watering and watering. I really have to get my rain collection containers.



275 gallon containers. You can get them clean, used, food grade for about $100. I want two. I've just been dithering while I figure out how to make a platform for them. I want them up at least 3 feet for gravity feed and easy bucket filling. But of course that much water weighs 2,287 pounds (= more than a ton), not counting the weight of the container. So whatever they sit on has to be VERY sturdy. And they have to be level, even though the ground where they would sit slopes away from the house (as it should).

Today it got cloudy. It thundered. Got a little breezy. Did it rain???...... NOOOOOOOO. Reaching the 100+ degrees now.

Hot and dry, hot and dry. I will say it has been so hot and sunny, it has driven the humidity down, which slowed down the progress of septoria on the tomato plants and gave them a few more weeks of life. But I am not planting anything right now. Just before this hot dry spell hit (about a month ago I guess), I planted more carrot seed. It never sprouted. Even though I am watering a lot, it is just too hard to keep seeds moist.

I was out watering veggie gardens again yesterday (heat index over 100). Everywhere the hose stream it, it kicked up a cloud of powdery dust. I had just watered those garden (a lot!) the day before, less than 24 hours before. How could the soil possibly have turned to powder in that amount of time !?!

Yeah, I've been having to water my peas like every other evening. It gets dry super fast. I shouldn't have put that peat moss in there years ago.

Heavy FOG and 72 at 7 am air feels sticky.

Happy Labor Day all!..... too hot to labor though. Right now it's 96, no rain for a month now,(not counting five minute sprinkles) and no rain in the future forecast. So sad. My yard is crumbling apart....deep cracks are forming in the yard and around the foundation of my house.

Journey to the Center of the Earth 2. No need to go hunting for a volcano or a mountain hole or tunnel to get to the Earth's center....just jump down these cracks.

I don't have cracks yet. But, my garden is full of compost so it can stay moist for a while. It is 81 degrees now with a high of 85 forcast for today. Winds are 10-15 mph so the Trades are turned on! Thank you, my air conditioning isn't working again. Humidity is 60% so it will be less humid as well. I am glad the hot days and nights of August are over. I still would not mind a trip to the pool or a movie to cool off.

Oh man, hot and dry, hot and dry!! We had a couple days that felt like fall with high temps down in the 80's and low humidity and I thought we had made it and then it zoomed right back up:

97 degrees today, then 92, 91, 94, 96, 98 !!, 95, 94 .... and not a trace of rain in the 10 day forecast. We have had hardly any rain since the beginning of July and this is in a place that normally gets at least 4 inches of rain per month year around. I really need to get the rain water containers together (for next year).

The saving grace that lets me know it is fall, is that unlike earlier, our low temps at night are all down in the high 60's, low 70's. That makes for heavy dew and cool mornings and evenings....

Yeah, it's still summer! Another 90+ day. We have also been in a dry period since mid July - every time storms would come through, this area would get a very small amount. Yet, at the end of August, I saw the weatherman listing the amount of rain up to that point, and we were still ahead of last year, which was the second wettest on record! This shows how wet it was before it got dry, and why fungal diseases were running rampant.

5:55am I’ve been up but it’s still dark outside. Twilight starts 6:05am, sun wont be up until 6:30am — I guess I’ll go have my first cup of coffee and breakfast

I got 2.08" of rain yesterday - most in a long time! What did you get in that storm, Apple?

Our days are still hot and humid. It is currently 91 and with 63% humidity we have a "feels like" temperature of 105 and it hasn't reached the hottest part of the day yet.

I've had to start watering a couple times a day to keep the ground moist where I set out new seeds last week that have broken ground and are starting to grow. If I let the ground dry out they have little chance of surviving right now.. Just yard longs and cucumbers in the ground sprouting and established hot peppers and Ichiban eggplant. I'll be putting in some snow pea seeds tomorrow along another trellis I have, but most everything else I want to plant is on hold until it cools off a bit more.

Today it reached 102. So sad. Right now it's 7:40 pm and temp is 90.

I still find it hard to believe your temperatures are hotter than mine and I am closer to the equator. High pressure North of the state will bring enhanced tradewind showers and breezy conditions. It will still be in the high 80's and most of the rain will fall on the windward side of the island. Although, I may get a few passing sprinkles in Central Oahu. Although the wind has picked up, it is a warm wind and humidity is 70% so it is still like being in a sauna.

We’re down to 56°F at 4:30am. Hopefully the eggplants won’t shut down yet, but no point in trying to let any more baby sized melons grow so might as well cull those. Just hope the fully sized ones on the vines will manage to ripen.

We have maybe 42 days/6 weeks until first average frost — I guess I will try sowing some greens like spinach and lettuce. Do I want radish? Is it too soon to try direct-sowing broccoli and onions to attempt overwintering?

imafan: You are on an island, so temperatures are moderated by the ocean. San Francisco is almost on an island (skinny peninsula) and it is unbelievably chilly in summer compared to Cincinnati, even though they are on the same latitude. SF basically has no summer most of the time (although it is being affected by climate change also and has had some record heat the last couple years).

We are still in the same weather pattern as when I posted three days ago. Tues thru Fri high temps: 96, 97, 96, 97. A week from today there is rain in the forecast, but sometimes that doesn't materialize. We will be at record highs. The Tues thru Friday record highs for the date are: 98, 96, 96, 97. So if the predictions are accurate, we will hit or exceed record highs for the date at least three of those four days!!

We had a few days awhile back that felt like fall-- temps in the 80's, no humidity, beautiful. I got all optimistic and planted seeds of carrots and chard. Watering every day, I did get some of the chard to sprout, but now I have to keep watering every day so the tiny seedlings don't die. Don't know if I can keep them alive through this. Carrots haven't shown yet at all and I don't know if they will. Now that we are back in this weather pattern, I am not planting anything else. Which means I am behind schedule for planting fall things like broccoli. But who knows, maybe first frost will be late also.....

When I sowed (2-4 hours soaked in water first) carrot seeds a while back when it was still hot, I borrowed the “piece of lumber” trick I think jal_ut recommended — except I didn’t have a board handy so I used very heavy cardboard (triple layer type used for appliances, etc.) soaked well in a bucket of water first. Watered every day from top of the cardboard and filled the surrounding swale/path with water as well. Removed the “board” after 4 days (this was a recommendation from another source — can’t remember where).

Out of the two beds, the one with fresh seeds did germinate well — the older seeds was spotty — maybe needed a few more days under the cardboard?

55°F this morning — I think Dorian is drawing colder air down to us as it passes. I wouldn’t be surprised if this turns around to hot air trailing after it later.

I looked at my wilted, pathetic garden and the few, stunted crops it is producing and I looked at the weather forecast and I decided it is just too wasteful to keep pouring water on it. So I am just letting everything die and will start over with fall crops when the weather finally breaks.

It is heartbreaking, but seems like what I have to do. It is a shame after all the water I have put on it since heat and drought struck early in July. But it is the old throwing good money after bad thing. And I have to keep watering all the shrubs, trees, and perennials.

I REALLY, REALLY need to get my 550 gallons of rainwater containment together for next year. Hopefully that will help us get through better. Climate change is creating different effects in different places. In Cincinnati, we got the polar vortex and started having colder , snowier winters. Here in Chattanooga, winters are warmer and wetter than they used to be and summers are hotter and drier. ....

Aww, so sorry @rainbowgardener. I know how you feel- so sad to see the stuff you'd loved and cared for just dry up. But we can't control the weather, or believe me, I would've brought Dorian this direction. As dry as it is, a hurricane is starting to sound pretty good right now.

rainbowgardener wrote:

I looked at my wilted, pathetic garden and the few, stunted crops it is producing and I looked at the weather forecast and I decided it is just too wasteful to keep pouring water on it. So I am just letting everything die and will start over with fall crops when the weather finally breaks.

I.

I know your dilemma. I got my water bill in early July and it was $160 and that was when I said it's not worth watering all this ground for what I'm currently getting, so I curtailed watering to just plants that I knew were going to survive our heat and humidity, then the rains began in earnest a couple weeks later that allowed me to stop watering completely.

Now I'm back to watering the areas under my trellises where I sowed cucumber, Japanese Yard Longs and Sugar Snap Peas that are up and growing. I just know if I miss a days watering there's a good chance they will wilt badly and possibly die. It is now in the upper 90's on my back porch in the direct sun.

WOOOOOOO -HOOOOOOOO!!!!!!

TomatoNut95 wrote:WOOOOOOO -HOOOOOOOO!!!!!!

So, you're saying you're collecting rainwater by the buckets full...……


Good for you my friend. But you really need to get some big rain barrels to do it more easily. Five gallon buckets fill up fast in a downpour.

I have a.....50? 55? Gallon barrel I dump the 5 gal. buckets in when they are full.

TomatoNut95 wrote:I have a.....50? 55? Gallon barrel I dump the 5 gal. buckets in when they are full.

You need to run a downspout from a gutter directly into that big drum and be done with toting 5 gallon buckets to fill it......

I will probably put that on my '2020 need-to-do' list, thanks @gumbo!

Did you see my post about water containers, here: viewtopic.php?f=10&t=76119&p=429551&hil ... rs#p429551

You can get a 275 gallon container used, clean, food grade for about $100 (I see them on craigslist all the time). That's what I meant when I mentioned 550 gallons of water storage. That would be two of them, each attached to a different downspout.

rainbowgardener wrote:Did you see my post about water containers, here: viewtopic.php?f=10&t=76119&p=429551&hil ... rs#p429551

You can get a 275 gallon container used, clean, food grade for about $100 (I see them on craigslist all the time). That's what I meant when I mentioned 550 gallons of water storage. That would be two of them, each attached to a different downspout.

Need to have them sitting on something solid as that is over a ton of water weight alone. Is it safe to assume the material used is thick enough to drill and put in a spigot near the bottom of the container so a faucet can be used to attach a hose when needing to water the garden?

On Sun Sep 08, 2019

applestar wrote:55°F this morning — I think Dorian is drawing colder air down to us as it passes. I wouldn’t be surprised if this turns around to hot air trailing after it later.

Forecast high is 91°F today, 96 with heat index. That’s probably NOT normal here.

Less than 1/2 inch of rain in the last week, but it’s supposed to rain tomorrow. I did water the whole garden and the newly transplanted and newly sprouted seedlings for 1/2 hour, 2 days ago, and sprinkled with watering can over the seedbed today.


...I think we have had more (frequent) rain falling this growing season than is usual, and did not have the “not a drop of rain” drought which is the norm, but I opted not to water wide areas — only spot-watering my garden beds — this year, and some of the trees in the unirrigated zones are suffering for it with early yellowing and some leaf loss.

It sometimes humors me when gardeners in other locations comment on the need to water. Without irrigation, growing much of anything in gardens here in the Wild West would be impossible. So, we maintain a regular schedule and are very fortunate to have adequate winter snowfall and a good aquifer. I realize that gardens elsewhere may not be set-up for irrigation and water can be expensive.

Summer cool-down seems to be ongoing. Yesterday's morning low was in the 40's. Today's high was 72°f, which I believe is right at normal. The clouds are huge and there are several thunderstorms a few miles away. A nearby weather station recorded .61 of an inch of rain recently. Don't laugh but that was a record for the date.

A 40° swing between high and low is possible at this time of year. So, you can see that a frost is a real possibility. I think we are okay in that regard but all we will need is a clear night.

A run to the gardens for desperate, last minute harvesting is likely and Steve may feel that "frost mitigation" is possible running sprinklers during hours of morning darkness.

Steve

It's still summer! Over 90° today, and humid again, and same yesterday, and again tomorrow! So we may be having a heat wave in mid-September! I will say my peppers haven't slowed down much.

@gumbo: if you look at the link I gave, it talks about the problem of building raised platform that is sturdy for 2,287 pounds of water. That's the only reason I don't already have them, trying to figure that out.

They come with holes that you can attach down spout to and attach hose to. (For $20 extra you can get a garden hose adapter) :



(They call these 275 gallon IBC totes and they come in food grade or not food grade)


I did pull some things (e.g. tomato plants) and let some planted seeds go. But I did keep watering the things that were doing best: peppers, okra, squash, basil and other herbs. But I looked at the weather forecast again now-- still ZERO rain in ten day forecast and still above 90 every single day. So I still may have to let more die....

By the end of the ten day forecast period, which will be past the fall equinox!, we should normally be barely into the 80's, much less 90's.

And this is now going on so long that not only is the late summer garden ruined, we may not have much fall garden either. Normally I would be planting seeds for fall garden by the end of Aug. But I can't plant seeds til the weather breaks and by then it will be so late. I can plant seeds for things to over winter, but not for fall.... First fall frost is expected first to second week in November.

Grass is so dry it crunches like walking on potato chips. It was 100 degrees Wed and 98 yesterday. Weather man said, 97 to 98 for another week with no rain. We got 2 good ripe watermelons before I pulled up the plants. Tomato plants are still hanging in there 4 of them died. All 16 pepper plants are looking good. Okra is the happiest plants on earth the hotter & dryer it gets the better it grows. Weather man claims it will be 100 today.

It is 78 degrees now with an expected high of 98. The winds are light 10 mph. It has sprinkled a bit over the last week, but it is just a brief sprinkle. Not enough rain to do much. I have optimistically started planting seeds for the garden. Beets, one tomato, eggplants, green onions and maybe some peppers and Kapoor basil have sprouted. I am going to plant more seeds today. The hardest thing to get right now will be soils and amendments for the garden. I am still looking for the smaller tomato cages for the peppers. The stores have already started to reduce the inventory in the garden areas to make way for Halloween and Christmas decorations.

I did water my roses last week since there hasn't been any appreciable rain for a while. The grass is very dry and is no longer green except in the parts that got some water from the sprinkler I used for the roses.

My sprinkler system has been off for a couple of years. I have some of the parts I need, I just don't look forward to that frustrating project. Many of my plants have died and what is left has adapted to living off rain. The agapanthus shrank a lot and I really need to redo that entire section since it has not been touched in years and has been invaded by the grass, hogging all the water and nutrients. The pineapple is happier though since I actually moved it earlier this year to a place where it gets more water even though it does have to compete with the weeds. The mint may bite the dust if I don't replant it soon.

I know what you mean, it's bugging me that stores are already pushing Halloween and Christmas stuff when September has barely begun. I'll you in on a secret. I still have a couple of chocolate Easter bunnies in my freezer. I think I'll go pull one out.

Well we finally have a few days where the high temperature number starts with 8, not 9. But STILL no rain in the ten day forecast.

It feels like fall, not summer, though. Days are shorter, nights are cool, mornings and evenings are cool, just the afternoons are hot. That means big rapid temperature swings. One of the days in the forecast, the night time low gets down to 59 degrees, but then the high the next day is 91!! That's like 32 degrees from early morning to late afternoon! For a couple weeks now we've been leaving windows open at night. The A/C is always set to 78 degrees, so as long as the temps stay below that, it doesn't kick on.

Our weather is still acting a bit like summertime with highs daily in the upper 80's to low 90's and nightly temps in the mid to upper 70's all the way to the 27th----------and probably beyond, but that is as far as the forecast predicts on the site I use.

WOO-HOO! Tropical depression Imelda is headed right my way! Not that I'm pleased that's gonna be stormy, but right now I'm not gonna look a gift rain in the mouth! My peas and pepper plants will probably start dancing! However, there goes drying my peppers outside. I'll use @SQWIB's idea about the oven. If not, I'll wait until the weekend is over.

rainbowgardener wrote:@gumbo: if you look at the link I gave, it talks about the problem of building raised platform that is sturdy for 2,287 pounds of water. That's the only reason I don't already have them, trying to figure that out.

I'd think to be safe it would require some sort of concrete pad under them, and I'd make sure it was about 4 inches thick and used reinforcing wire to make it more solid.

I'd not want to try to put in posts in the ground and build a wooden platform with the potential for that amount of weight---even if the posts were cemented in place.