As I’ve mentioned in many posts, all plants appreciate a little protection in the form of shade from the blazing summer sun.
This is true for vegetables and perennials plants.
Fortunately, most of my garden (about 85%) – gets that shade. About 4 Pm shade moves into the lower end of my garden and within the next hour shade is within feet of the upper end of the garden.
I appreciate it as much as my plants since I don’t like to work in the sun. The shade allows me to work in the garden in late afternoon and evening in relative comfort.
If you don’t have shade in your garden, I hope you have plans to remedy that in the future. It will made a tremendous difference to your garden in terms of less stress in drought and in terms of harvest.
For example – lettuce planted where it will be shaded from hot afternoon sun will last much longer than lettuce that is exposed to sun all day. Even heat lovers like tomatoes, peppers, and eggplant enjoy some shade in the hottest part of the day or those late afternoon hours.
I came across a great tip the other day for those of you who have no shade and are waiting for your plantings to grow and need a temporary way of dealing with the problem.
A lady on a forum I frequent suggested using the umbrellas that you can clamp to something not likely to move. Or use the 7 foot umbrellas that you can anchor in the ground. She mentioned that both were very inexpensive (about $5 and $10) and that they sometimes go on sale around the 4th of July for 50% off!
I thought that was a great idea!
Another idea she gave was to make shade covers. Sink 4 sticks or rods into the ground to form a rectangle or square. Attach some type of cloth to the rods to shade your plants. Maybe pieces of an old sheet would work.
Final Thought
These tips are easy and would be very effective. I just had to share them with you.
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Organic Gardening it easy, efficient, effective and it’s a lot easier.
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