When Pigs Fly! "You can't grow that in the desert." YES, you can.

Dear Folks,

A dear friend gifted us with a little metal statue.  We don't typically put art in the garden, because our garden IS art.  However this little girl flying pig (I named her "Daisy Mae") immediately brought to mind the oft-repeated statement and generality - "You can't grow _______ in the desert."

The comment/statement is made so often, that people take it as truth because they fear the summer heat, or they tried planting tomatoes in June (wrong time), or stuck a new shrub or vegetable plant in the ground without hardening off, or the local chain nursery sold it, so it must be planted "now.", or, or - the list goes on with folks either trying to replicate the timing for gardening based on where they came from, or because they simply presume "they" can't do it correctly.

Let's do a reality check on what is grown, typically, in the desert.

Grass!  If I was going to choose one plant which puts the "you can't grow that here" statement to test, it would be grass.

What do people do to have a lawn in the desert?  They pamper, nurture, feed, water -- a lot -- and as one wag put it, use precious resources to grow something, they then cut down and THROW AWAY what they just cut!!

Here is real reality check, if you ate the plant, it can probably be grown here in the desert.

If you compare the actions required to have a green lawn in the desert to growing plants you eat, you will spent less everything growing food instead of lawns.

Daisy Mae, the flying pig, is surrounded by my Bradford watermelon plant still going strong on October 8, 2016.  I have yet to harvest the last - very large - melon and the plant is still putting on flowers.  It remains to be seen whether we get more fruit, but the point is, I planted a couple of seeds, in an automatically watered bed, augmented the watering in the early weeks, and then let nature take its course.  No more anything, no extra fertilizer, cutting, or daily/weekly maintenance.  The only 'extra' thing we had to do was to occasionally 'herd' the vines back into the bed.

Maybe you have a gravel covered yard and think you are saving money.  This is where our sun and heat IS an issue.  "Pea gravel, volcanic rock and similar stones have a high capacity for absorbing and retaining heat, which they then release as the sun goes down. Rocks also reflect a lot of heat off of their exposed surfaces. The combination of the two factors can increase the day and evening temperatures in the area and make your house hot, especially when you have these ground covers near your exterior walls."  Which translates into higher A/C costs to compensate.

The utility companies frequently publish how much savings you achieve by lowering or changing your temperature settings during the summer.  If gravel raises the average outside air temperature by 10 degrees or more (it does),  your a/c has to work harder to compensate for all that reflected heat off the gravel.  Electricity cost savings can be put into "greening" your yards with food plants, which create cooler zones, provide eye appeal and you can EAT the plants instead of cutting them and throwing them away.

Edible Ground Cover Plants Instead of Grass or Gravel:

BETTER than Grass or Gravel!

It can be as simple as growing squash (pumpkins or zucchini) melons (cantaloupe or watermelon), sweet potato vines, or tomatoes and let them sprawl all over the bare ground (YES tomatoes - they actually produce better in the warm weather sprawling instead of staking).  Gives new meaning to a "ground cover" which 1) cools the surface temperatures, 2) makes attractive foliage and 3) provides food (fruit and the edible sweet potato leaves along with the roots).

Think outside the lawn or gravel for better, cooler, more useful plants!

If you are need to my blog, or new to gardening in the Phoenix Metro area, check out my recent post on what to plant / sow in October.

Have a great day in the garden,

Please share if you enjoy my posts, thank you!


-- Catherine, The Herb Lady

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Tomato Question

Dear Folks,

I had a comment and question from GG to my last post on what heirloom varieties to grow during the summer in the desert. The answer is not one of either or -- tomatoes stop setting fruit after night time temperatures are consistently 80 and above. They may continue to set flower, but you will not get fruit.

Any of the cherry, pear or grape size tomatoes will fruit longer into the heat of the summer. Last year our black cherry plum (actually a large grape sized fruit) gave us fruit into late July, then quit until the night time temps fell back down below 80 in late August/early September, when they gave us another crop until first frost.

Some sources for heirlooms are:

www.rareseeds.com
www.victoryseeds.com
www.territorialseeds.com
www.nativeseeds.org
www.reneesgarden.com

Google for heirloom and tomato and "safe seed pledge".

The safe seed pledge is important because whether a seed is heirloom or hybrid if the seller posts the SSP then they are promising to not knowingly grow, produce or sell GMO seeds.

Also check out www.richters.com and www.mountainvalleygrowers.com for seeds and plants.

Have a wonderful day,


-- Catherine, The Herb Lady

Frost Burn Damage - Ugly but Healthy!

Good Day Folks,

In the desert we have two types of direct weather related damage — frost damage (really a kind of ‘burn') and sun burn. Both do identical injury to the plants and both should be dealt with in similar fashion.

First — Don't touch the damage until the danger is over! If you are a gardener more interested in beauty than longevity of the plant, you should probably be gardening only with ornamentals, although you will miss the shear pleasure of harvesting your own bounty from your own gardens, while enjoying their beauty most of the year.

Unless we have a severe weather experience, most frost ‘burn' or sun burn are on the top of the plant only, and the damaged, dried out portions provide protection to the lower healthy foliage and fruit. If you cut the damage off before the danger is over it is like exposing new baby skin to full sun or cold - the damage will be greater and you could lose the plant.

Second — watch for new growth below the damaged area, sometimes beginning at the soil level, but often beginning at branching areas. This is a good indication that you can start the pruning process and that the frost danger is over.

Third — once the danger is over, you can begin pruning off the dead branches a "little" at a time — DO NOT cut it all off at once — give the protected growth time to acclimate to the sun and air by working around the plant pruning off about a fourth or fifth of the plant then waiting a day or two and do the next section — it should take you about a week to do all the pruning.

Some plants grown here in the desert such as basil or tomato, which you have successfully wintered over with cloth protection, will take a bit longer to get started — their growth is triggered by the warming soil, not just the lack of frost, so watch FIRST for that new growth at the base or nodes of the plant, before beginning to prune.

As we move into the warmer temps of spring, keep that water meter handy for checking soil moisture content.

Welcome to spring in the desert!

Accuweather is a great site for getting detailed weather forecast info by zipcode. http://www.accuweather.com — you can sign up to receive a 5-day brief forecast and go to the site for detailed long range (15 day) information.

-- Catherine, The Herb Lady

P.S. With the rains we have had this year, we should have a spectacular wild flower display in the desert. To find out where wild flowers are showing up now and later on click here for the desertusa site.

80+ yesterday - get the frost protectors out, and chocolate flowers

Dear Folks,

As you desert gardeners know, or are learning, we tend to roller-coaster from summer to fall and winter to spring, and this year is no different.

Here we have had the most lovely high 70s and even low 80 day-time temps for the last several days and the long range forecast is for possible snow in the desert -- yes I said snow -- somewhere around February 15th.

We have a couple of systems moving in - one today through this weekend (7 and 8th) bringing clouds, cooler weather, and some rain. It is then supposed to warm up slightly then dip down - way down during the day and at night - in time for valentine's weekend.

Phoenix central area may remain warmer due to the heat island effect of all that concrete and asphalt, but all desert gardeners should have their frost covers ready. If the overnight forecast in your area is 40 or lower, you will have some frost.

There is a silver lining to these clouds, though -- we will mostly likely have a lovely wildflower season in the desert, where the hills and valleys are painted in desert colors of gold, blue, lavender and more. Look for the display to begin in ernest sometime in March and continue through at least a part of April. Last spring the hills leading up to Boyce Thompson Arboretum looked they were painted in solid gold, and sides of the road were in royal blues and purples - breath-taking.

To replace a chilly valentine weekend, promise your valentine a trip to the desert to enjoy the wild flowers and don't forget to add chocolate to the picnic.

Speaking of chocolate -- do you know there are chocolate scented flowers? There is even one that tastes like unsweetened cocoa!

Most chocolate scented flowers are not edible, but the exception is the Chocolate Flower (Berlandiera lyrata) with the flower head tasting of unsweetened cocoa and smelling like dark chocolate when opened in the morning.

Some medicinal uses were found among the Native People of the southwest (the plant is native here) along with references to use of the flower heads in sausage -- kind of like a Native mole flavoring. --(Castetter, Edward F. 1935 Ethnobiological Studies in the AmericanSouthwest I. Uncultivated Native Plants Used as Sources of Food. University of New Mexico Bulletin 4(1):1-44 (p. 19).)

This plant is also called chocolate daisy, greeneyes, lyre-leaf greeneyes, and brooch flower.

Look for seed packets or plants for sale now into late spring. They will take full sun, but for a longer growing season, find a spot in the garden where they will get some afternoon shade moving into the summer.

With the temperatures eventually moving into spring conditions here I will share tomato growing tips in the desert in my next blog.

Have a great day,

-- Catherine, The Herb Lady