Plants I have loved and lost

Category: FRED - the garden | Posted: Mon Jun 19, 2006 6:07 pm

This is day 43 of no rain. Houston is flooding and parts of Dallas got multi-inch rain Saturday night and my yard go a scant 1/8th inch. Some might say that some rain is better than no rain, but in the case of my yard that doesn't hold water...bad pun attempt. My garden beds are covered with mulch so anything under 1/2 inch just gets the top of the mulch wet and evaporates in the sun, the plants get nothing except the sprinkle might dust off thier leaves.

There are cracks in the ground and most are 6 to 8 inches deep.

So far I have lost:
Snapdragons, they were so big and bushy last year. I bought new ones before I realized that last years plants had reseeded...but they are all gone.
The eyeball plants I found last spring, they never really had much of a chance since the rain stopped about the time I put them in the ground.
The summer squash, got two small squash and then the plants started die-ing.
The zinnias, marigolds and daiseys have given up no matter how often I water them.
The Green Cotton Lavender is growing weaker.
The patchouli plants, all the leaves have dark edges and are curling up and they have barely doubled in size from the 6" pot they came in almost 4 months ago.
The hardy Hibiscus have stopped setting blooms, usually they bloom from June thru Sept.
The Dusty Miller are stunted, haven't grown since I planted them.
The HorseHerb is suffering, it will probably come back next spring...it did this last year in the drought too.
The cucumbers are just about history. The vines are only about 2 feet long, they put out a few blooms but the cucumbers are deformed and very bitter...they needed rain in May to finish producing in late May and early June before the heat of a normal summer killed them. That didn't happen.
The dwarf hollyhocks which normally do not bloom until about this time of the year and go thru July, Bloomed in May and are pretty much only good for birdfood now, the little sparrows love to hop from stem to stem picking out the seeds.

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eileen wrote on Mon Jun 19, 2006 8:55 pm:

Awwww Toni what a shame that your garden is suffering so badly. I'll keep my fingers tightly crossed that you get some decent rain soon. It's really hard to watch your plants die in front of you isn't it?

dooley wrote on Mon Jun 19, 2006 10:46 pm:

It's dry here too. I water every day and some things I water twice a day. Lots of little plants died before they got started. Severe drought in all of Arizona. Big fire to the north of us. Dooley

Pianolady wrote on Tue Jun 20, 2006 1:04 am:

I sure hope you get rain soon. It does sound discouraging. We're too dry here too, but nothing like that.

Pinkiered wrote on Tue Jun 20, 2006 2:33 am:

We finally got rain a few days ago and again this morning. I lost alot too but not nearly as much as you. Im so sorry. I was having to water twice a day too and soak the yard two a week there at the end.

I hope you get rain soon.