no growth or fruit

[Roxi306]

I'm new to gardening. In early April I planted tomatoes, peppers, beans and cucumbers. The cukes were the first to bear fruit but soon developed some sort of disese and died off. The other plants look healthy but their growth seems to have halted and are bearing no fruit. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

[hit or miss]

You're probably hitting a heat problem about now. How hot are the daytime highs? Plants kinda stall out when it gets really hot. Pics would help too!

[Roxi306]

90's every day. I have raised boxes, one box gets 12 + hours of sun. the other box gets about 8 hours. All of my plants have stopped growing. Is there anything I can do?

[hendi_alex]

Is April a normal planting time for such veggies in SW Florida? I would think that you planted very late in the season where nothing is going to do very well with the hot temperatures. If I were you, would check the local extension service for a guide for proper planting times in your area. It may be that your best gardening comes between late fall and early spring.

[Roxi306]

I did plant in early April, however, we did have an exceptionally hot spring My tomatoes are bearing planty of fruit but very slow to ripen. Everything else has just stalled, even though the plants look healthy.

[hendi_alex]

We plant in the second or third week in April here in Camden, in zone 8. It would seem to me that S.W. Florida would have a much earlier planting date.

There are a couple of planting guides at this site. But April is the very last planting date for most 'summer' crops. Looks to me as if you should be planting much earlier for your summer garden. Look at table three which gives planting dates for a wide range of vegetables. Lots of good info here for a gardener in Florida!

[url]https://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/vh021[/url]

[rainbowgardener]

Agree with Alex. April is when I plant all those things here in Ohio. South FLA has very different seasons. I would think you would plant beans, tomatoes, peppers in August to grow through the fall and maybe again in Jan.

Given that they are planted now, you could try using shade cloth to give them some protection from the full sun especially in the 12 hr bed.

[Roxi306]

Thank you for all your help. I will try shade to salvage what I have. Next time I plant I will be better informed. As a novice I thought "plant them and they will grow."

[garden5]

Sometimes it can be that simple....but other times not so much .

If you contact your local university, they can point you towards you local extension agency and they will have a wealth of information on gardening in your climate.

[rainbowgardener]

Next time I plant I will be better informed. As a novice I thought "plant them and they will grow."

The art and science of the gardener and what it really means to have a "green thumb" is all about understanding what conditions your plants need to thrive and it is different for every species. If you can provide the combination of temperatures, sun exposure, water, soil type that the plant likes best, it will thrive for you without you doing anything else and people will say you have a really green thumb. If you try to grow a plant in conditions it doesn't like, you will be constantly babying it, fertilizing, etc and it won't thrive anyway, just limp along. Usually providing the right conditions actually means choosing the right plants for the conditions you have, since it's often difficult to adapt the conditions.

Plant them in the conditions they like and they will grow!!