It was a scorcher of a month and my plants do look worse for it. It seems staring off earlier in the year had the biggest payout. As of now, I’m not getting much of a harvest from anything. Some plants are on their way out and others might bloom but don’t seem to produce much.

Tomatoes

I was hoping by now with having two tomato plants that I would finally get a tomato to enjoy. It seems between all the rain and heat they are just not happy. I’ve seen a couple of flowers but more times than not they end up getting knocked off by a heavy rainstorm. I’m still hoping to get some tomatoes it as just not in July.

At least my first tomato is getting tall enough now I can take a sideways shot of it. Hard to tell but it’s just getting over its cage. I do have a second cage to put on top like last year if it goes that route. I just hope to have some tomatoes growing on it soon.

The second tomato is starting to get up there as well. It even had a flower on it at some point. It however fell off and did not produce anything as a result of it. It is also in a place where it gets a lot more daily sunlight than my first tomato plant.

Bell Peppers

I did get a couple of bell peppers this month they were however quite small. I’ve even had to toss some of them out as they fell off and where rotting in the dirt. The mite infestation also seems to be affecting my bell peppers the most. I just can’t seem to get rid of the darn mites even after a few waves and treatment of different things.

My second pepper plant has started to wilt this week. It has plenty of water and I know the drain is working. If it keeps getting worse I’ll try tipping it on its side and fully allowing it to drain out.

I think the bottom might even be detachable on the potter. I’d rather just not go that route as I’ve had several plastic planters cracking or even break when trying to move them around too much. It is supposed to be full sun. This plant has been getting when it’s not raining heavily outside.

Next month I might have to resort to moving these out of the area I have them in if the infestation gets much worse. I have been holding off on doing so as the local wildlife will eat the peppers and anything else growing once I place it out there.

The spiders have been moving in heavy on these bell peppers as well. This month I have left them alone and done my best to try and avoid the spiders. I did not notice any poisons spiders so for now I’ll just consider them little helpers. Sadly, they are not enough of a match either.

Herbs

At least most of my herbs have been sticking around and I still enjoy just going out and cutting some off for a random meal when needed. Some of the herbs have improved somewhat during this month. Sadly, I did end up replacing one which has worked out great after doing so.

As always the parsley does not seem to care much of what is going on and everything just leaves it alone. Sometimes parts of the plant will die off but it is producing enough for my small demand of it that there is no challenge for it keeping up.

The chives are least holding in there. Today was not a very perky day for them. We just had heavy rain the other day. Some days they are standing tall and days like today not so much.

My first Sage plant ended up dying or at least became in a state that it no longer had any leaves and stop showing much life. So I ended up picking a second one as seen in the photo. It was about half the size when I got it. I have been keeping it in a more shaded area which seems to be working out for it.

Jalapeno

Never would I have thought a Jalapeno would be so bad off during the growing season. Even last year’s one which I tossed out and left outside almost didn’t look this bad during our “winter” time here. It seems the infestation has done it in. I do think it can still come back but it’s not looking hopeful.

I did end up getting one last massive harvest out of it during July. Well over 20 Jalapeno I picked over a weekend. I could tell it was struggling and I was hopeful that easing its burden would give it a better fighting chance. Turns out not to be the case.

I almost miss having so many Jalapenos I was struggling to come up with ways to put them to use. Hopefully next month this plant will recover and be back on track again.

Final Thoughts

It was a bumpy month at least most things are still holding in there. I was gone for a part of it so things might not have gotten watered for a couple of days outside of some rainwater. Seems every day I’ve been back we have been getting nothing but heavy rains almost daily.

I hope everyone else’s garden is going great. I still seem to be fighting off a plague of mites or whatever they are at this point. Only time will tell if they will fully end my garden early this year.

Garden Journal 2020

• March An Early Start
• April Was A Battlefield And Most Things Survived
• May Growth
• June Had High Temps, Flash Flooding, And More

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Photos were taken and content was written by @Enjar.