July Gardener's Calendar

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Hi! I am Dave Epstein. This is Growing Wisdom. Our July calendar and this is the part of Growing Wisdom where I like to give you some advice on things that you might want to do during a particular month. Now July, smacked dabbed in the middle of the summer, we are smacked dabbed in the field of dianthus, just spectacular and do not just look at your garden or observe it from inside. One of the things I like to do is bring stuff inside as well, you know, you can cut your flowers, bring them in, that way you get to enjoy them in the evening as well. You know the gardens during the summer, you got to watch water, July can be very, very dry in parts of the country so you certainly want to be watering. Check for bugs, you know, you could use things like lady bugs to really attack the bugs that are not as beneficial like an aphid. Check your plants to be sure there are not other problems going on and especially if you have annuals, I tend to remove the plants that are not doing so well. Take them right out of the garden. Also do some harvesting, you know, if you have peas growing, harvest the peas, harvest lettuces, you can still do planting this time of the year. However be careful about watering, do not forget that you need to water. If you go away for one or two weeks, check with your neighbor, ask them to water your garden. One of the worst things you can do is come back and find everything is dried out, specially those containers that you might have planted up earlier. Keep the lawn a little bit longer. Remember July is usually very hot, keeping your lawn at three inches instead of two or one inch will help to conserve some moisture. Also, if you are in a part where you are getting a lot of rain this particular July, shut that irrigation system off, you will save yourself some water. Just remember to turn it back on if the rains do stop. Take a walk along other peoples gardens. We have lots of perennial flowers growing here but there are other types, you know, you have got things like veronica which is really spectacular especially early on in the month and you can find flowers that you might like to put in your garden by looking at other people’s gardens. You go down to something like a gaillardia and you look at this and you can see just what a spectacular flower it is or even just something as simple as the daisies and you might not have this in your garden this year but might be a good thing to put in your garden for next year. Another thing that you can do that is always is a lot fun is go strawberry picking especially early in the month, the strawberries are really quite terrific. It is a great way to support some of the local farms, I actually got some strawberries growing here that are pretty close to being ready. Strawberries are really easy to grow as well and you could grow them at your house. If you have other things like tomatoes you might be pruning those up during the month of July, stay on top of those things and basically just kind of watch your garden. July is really one of those months that I try to enjoy and hopefully you will enjoy it as well. Come back every month, every week for all of our tips, hints, and helps at www.GrowingWisdom.com.

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