Cold!

These few days of cold weather will likely burn some ficus trees and freeze the buds on lemon trees. This is the third or fourth time in 10 years that it has been cold enough to damage our Lisbon Lemon tree. We'll prune it back and have a year of nearly no lemons (as opposed to this year when we have a few hundred). These cold spells don't bother our grapefruit tree, perhaps because it grows in more of an umbrella shape that holds in heat better.

After spending several years nurturing a plant to maturity and losing it to one night of cold I surrendered and put in something better suited to our climate. We can't cover our lemon tree because it is so large, but it gets along fine.

One thing we will cover is our backflow assembly on the irrigation line. We've had that freeze before and it was no fun buying a replacement - since thousands of people in the southwest had the same problem and the stores were out of stock. So there is a painting cloth over our water pipes for the next few days.

Getting Ready...

It's time to get planting areas ready for vegetables. For those who are interested in flowers the big box stores (Lowes) just got in their flower bulbs. We put in some Gladiolus this year.

Vegetables are not really available yet. Bear in mind I say that because we are looking for 6-packs of tomato plants. We took a hiatus from planting tomatoes from seed this year so are really hoping to see the seedlings show up in nursery's soon. I did start some seeds yesterday as a backup plan and to keep my anxiety level down...

Bare root fruit trees should be arriving in stores this month if you are looking for apricots, pomegranates or the like.

Now is the time to plan what you want to plant and where, and get the soil ready. We usually till the garden and add a bit of fertilizer a couple weeks before setting out anything. The weather should be warm enough in about 4-5 weeks to set out tomato seedlings.

Irrigation Maintenance

Now is a great time to do irrigation system maintenance. Things to check for include bad valves, timer settings, timer backup batteries, leaking lines, broken or plugged emitters, damaged or plugged sprinkler heads (especially if you overseeded the lawn) and broken pressure regulators on drip lines. Our half-inch drip lines are ten years old and one has been splitting seams. My mission yesterday was to replace that entire line. However, upon opening the control valve boxes I discovered that the valve feeding the drip line to the trees had gone bad. We hadn't noticed but I'm sure the trees were feeling starved for water. There was also a bad pressure regulator on the line feeding our grapes which was responsible for flooding the irrigation valve box.

Instead of laying new drip line, I re-built the valve and backflow assembly on the two damaged lines. This is the third time the smaller, cheaper pressure regulators have failed, so I spent the extra money for a larger, better quality regulator (I have three of these that have gone ten years with no issues). Done! Now I know plants are getting water when the timer says so. Next weekend we'll do the line replacement.

Onions

The box stores have onion sets for sale. For $2 you can plant 60 onions, so for our family $4 means we'll have fresh onions for another year without purchasing any more from the store.

These are different than the ones sold in the spring. These are like very small onions, while the ones sold in spring look more like tiny leeks.

Planting Garlic

 The easy way to plant garlic. These two bunches will be enough for backyard BBQ marinades all next summer. Separate the bunches into individual cloves, dig a trench about 3-4 inches deep somewhere that already gets regular water (in this case the roses). Place each clove pointy end up about six inches apart and cover with soil.

If we don't use them all some will grow again next year.

September is for Winter Gardens

September is the time to plant winter and spring garden vegetables. Things that will do fine through our mild winters include:

onions
garlic
peas
beets
carrots
broccoli
cauliflower

Planting these now will get them up and growing before "winter" sets in. Then in the spring they will "spring" into bloom and ripen before it gets hot in May.

Onions and Garlic

It's time to plant onions and garlic. The onions we raised from seed last year are still in the ground (those we haven't eaten) and are starting to grow again. Seed is easy to start on a wet paper towel. Place an empty egg carton upside down, put a damp paper towel or napkin inside, and sprinkle seeds on it and close. Within a few days the seeds will sprout and you can set them in potting soil. When they are 2-3 inches tall you can set them outside about 6 inches apart. The winters here are not cold enough to hurt them and you will soon have an always-fresh supply of onions. For the less adventurous, wait until the home improvement stores have onion sets in stock and set those out in the yard.

For easy, fresh garlic, pick up one or two bulk garlic at the grocery store and break them into individual cloves. Plant these about six inches apart pointy side up somewhere in the yard that gets water regularly and you will have fresh garlic all summer next year. Like onions, our light frosts won't bother garlic.