Gardening This Weekend: July 9, 2026
Your plants are counting on your checking on them often and tending to them regularly. Read through my suggestions.
PLANT
• Peppers (ornamental and edible) for the fall garden.
• Tomatoes in South Texas. Stick with small and mid-sized varieties. In Central and North Texas, you are late, so plant in protected location or plant in large pots (10-gal.)
• Fall annual color. Copper plants, firebush, purple fountaingrass, fanflower, Cora XDR periwinkles, pentas, angelonias, marigolds, zinnias, celosias.
• Fall perennials as they appear in nurseries: fall asters, Mexican bush salvias, Mexican mint marigold, spider lilies, autumn crocus, naked lady lilies, oxblood lilies.
PRUNE
• Seedheads and flowerbuds from coleus, basil, lamb’s ear, caladiums, mint. Flowers stop development of future leaf and stem growth.
• Broken branches from shade trees. Leave no stubs. If work involves branches larger than 4 in. in diameter or if it’s above your head, better call in an insured Certified Arborist.
• Oaks now that we’re approaching mid-July. Pathologists and foresters tall us that oak wilt risks are greatly lessened from this point through mid-February, although you should always seal cuts with paint. Certified Arborists know how to do necessary pruning at any time.
FERTILIZE
• Iron and sulfur combination products to correct iron chlorosis (yellowed leaves with dark green veins most prominent on newest growth). Keep iron products off concrete and stone surfaces to prevent staining.
• Bermuda turf with all-nitrogen fertilizer with 30 to 40 percent of that N in slow-release form. Do not feed St. Augustine during hot weather to lessen chance of gray leaf spot.
• Container plants and hanging baskets with water-soluble, complete-and-balanced food at least weekly to keep them growing actively.
ON THE LOOKOUT
• New shrubs and trees must be watered by hand their first 1-2 years in your landscape. Drip irrigation, sprinkler irrigation, and the over-rated water bags around tree trunks won’t do the job. Soak them every other day with an amount of water equal to the size of the pot from which they were planted. See related story last week.
• Large, striped and low-flying wasps are probably predatory cicada killers (beneficial). They build nests in the ground. Their encounters with cicadas are very noisy, after which they take the paralyzed insects back to serve as food for their larvae. They are harmless to humans unless provoked, in which case their stings can be very painful.
• Grasshoppers devouring foliage of vegetables, ornamentals. Sprays should be applied in a downward sweep to coat the pests as they try to fly away. Let your Texas Certified Nursery Professional show you the products available for their control.