It’s time to make a to-do list for next year’s garden

There’s not much to be done in our gardens in late July. It’s too hot outside to plant or fertilize or amend the soil. Do plan on making a weekly check of the irrigation systems, making repairs and adjusting timers if necessary-harvesting regularly and cleaning up fallen fruits and vegetables-and monitoring for pest insects, including the fairly recent stinkbug arrivals, the Bagrada bug and the leaffooted bug, both of which suck the juices out of ripe fruits. (Check on the UC Davis website, http://www.ipm.ucdavis.edu for photos of the stinkbugs and their damage).

Late July is a good time to assess and review successes and failures in our gardens. The severe drought and high summer temperatures in our area really stress plantings. Take a little time to see how well the plants and trees in your garden are surviving this summer so that you can replace, replant or transplant whenever the rains finally come.

We moved last year to a home with a professionally-designed drought tolerant landscape with all the plantings on drip irrigation (no grass at all). This design may have looked good on paper, but many plants have died or are stunted, leaving a lot of bare open spots.

A major problem in this pretty-on-paper garden is that the heavy clay soil was not amended before planting. Root systems have not been able to grow outside the confines of the planting holes which contain the lighter soil that was in the original nursery container. The clay soil has baked so hard that water runs right off it. Soil amendment will be first on the to-do list this winter if we get enough rain to penetrate the soil.

Successful plantings in these difficult conditions are nepeta or catmint, yarrow and, in partial shade, Japanese forest grass and dwarf hebe. Unsuccessful plantings are kangaroo paws and prostrate ceanothus-the kangaroo paws have few leaves and the flower stalks quickly dried out; only one of five ceanothus is still alive. The characias euphorbia is alive but the leaves are scorched.

The raised vegetable bed was only a third full of dirt, so I filled the bed and turned in eight large bags of a lightweight soil amendment that contains beneficial bacteria and fungi. The addition of the lightweight soil amendment rather than planting soil or topsoil was an experiment. I was hoping that the amendment would hold water better than heavier soil and allow for easier and faster root development. The experiment seems to be working well. The tomatoes (Black Prince, Yellow Flame, Cherokee Purple and a mystery, mislabeled small red tomato) are producing quite well. The peppers have grown tall to reach more sunlight and are now setting flowers and fruit. There’s very little wilting during hot spells even with drip irrigation limited to the mandated twice weekly schedule. Whiteflies briefly attacked the tomatoes during the first really hot spell in June, but have since disappeared. No sign of other pest insects yet.

I’ve started a list of replacement plants, which will include more of those that have been able to thrive in bad soil on limited water and which attract pollinators, such as yarrows and catmint.

This story was originally published July 29, 2015 at 9:21 AM with the headline "It’s time to make a to-do list for next year’s garden."