Gardening This Weekend: July 5, 2018

If you’ve been away for a few days you’re probably behind on lots of things. Here’s a shortened summer version of your critical tasks for your landscape and garden.

PLANT

• Fall tomato transplants. It’s almost last chance for most of the state. Small and mid-sized varieties. Protect transplants from hot afternoon sun for a few days until they acclimate.
• Sun- and heat-tolerant annuals. Your local independent retail nursery manager can show you the best.
• Crape myrtles. They’re still in full bloom. Choose the colors you like, but be sure their mature heights fit the space you have for them.

PRUNE

• Trim seedheads and spent flower stalks off spring and early summer perennials.
• Odd new shoots off shrubs to maintain good growth forms. However, avoid formal shearing whenever you can.
• Mow lawn at recommended height. Raising height does not improve its summer durability.

FERTILIZE

• Bermuda with high-nitrogen fertilizer with high concentration of slow-release nitrogen.
• Iron-deficient plants (showing yellowed leaves with dark green veins most prominently on newest growth first). Apply iron supplement with sulfur included to help acidify soil. Iron is far less soluble in alkaline soils.
• Patio pots and hanging baskets every time you water them to replace nutrients leached out by frequent watering.

 

ON THE LOOKOUT

• Gray leaf spot in St. Augustine. See related story this issue.
• Chinch bugs in St. Augustine causing patches of dry-looking grass in hottest, sunniest parts of yard. Watering, however, doesn’t help. Part the grass at the edge of dying turf and you’ll see the BB-sized black insects with white diamonds on their backs. Treat with labeled insecticide.
• Spider mites attacking wide variety of landscape, garden plants. See related story in last week’s e-gardens.