Summer Garden

It's not your imagination - this is a dry summer.

I use my rain gauges to record precipitation amounts in my calendar so I can compare year to year, and this summer has been a dry one!

At this time of year I'm always especially grateful that I put down weed barrier fabric and gravel throughout my property, since the monsoon season has yet to drop any significant rain on me in over a month. Besides keeping the weeds at bay and controllable throughout the growing season, my weed barrier setup also helps the soil retain what moisture we do get and make it available to my plants.

Another thing I'm doing right now is cutting back a bunch of my non-woody perennials by two-thirds to three-quarters. This de-stresses them, decreasing their water needs right now, and they will most likely replace their blooms later, once the temps are lower and there's more moisture.

Even though nature hasn't provided much moisture this summer so far, my established trees, shrubs, and drought-tolerant perennials are hanging in there, with little to no additional water from me.

They'd better, because this is the summer of tough love from me! With the exception of my veggies and a couple "fancy plant" gardens, I'm leaving most areas to fend for themselves. If they can't hack it, they can go!

Perennials that are thriving in my garden without much extra help beyond that layer of weed barrier and gravel include penstemons, fernbush, apache plume, sage/salvia, sumacs, sedums, dianthus, santolina, partridge feather tansy, artemisia, junipers, summer blooming alliums, agastache/hyssop, and irises.