Dear Miss Floribunda,
The heat and drought this summer have taken a toll on my garden. Only the geraniums that line my front walk seem OK. The leaves on my azaleas and hydrangeas have turned yellow and fallen off though I’ve watered them thoroughly weekly and mulched them. My trees look very stressed. I hope they will all perk up once fall comes. I hope I do, too, because my energy level has not been high enough to water more often. Even if everything does survive this year, I worry that next summer will be no better, or even worse.
Can you or any of your experts help me cope?
Fricasséed on Farragut Street
Dear Fricasséed,
You are certainly wise to mulch your plants if you have no ground cover, and I think geraniums and other pelargoniums and succulents are a wonderful choice during drought. They store water in their stems and leaves and love direct sun. Other good dry-climate choices are dahlias for sun, caladiums for shade, and cannas for either sun or shade.
choice during drought.
Photo Credit: UNSPLASH
Now, your azaleas are shallow rooted, and so they need some watering every day rather than weekly. I hope you have placed them and your hydrangeas in partial shade. The name of the hydrangea, which means “water vessel” in Greek, gives a clue to its gluttony for water. I water mine in the early morning and at twilight every single day unless it rains. During a heatwave, you can even water at night to avoid instant evaporation. There is no danger of fungus during a drought.
Also, during times of extreme heat, it’s best not to water during the warmest hours of the day so that the water will not heat up, burning leaves and boiling roots. It’s also much better for you to keep inside when temperatures climb near 100 F. Otherwise, you’re courting sunstroke if you stay outside for more than half an hour.
I asked my neighbor Herb Hill, whose garden is lush and green, for advice. He recommends soaker hoses and does not advise sprinklers or any form of overhead watering. A network of soaker hoses can be set up before the hot weather sets in. They are especially effective for keeping azaleas and dipsomaniac hydrangeas happy and healthy.
He also finds soaker hoses effective in the vegetable garden, especially if plants with similar watering needs are grouped together. Obviously, melons need most water, and root vegetables the least. You can set timers on soaker hoses to control the amount of water going to each bed. Although they are most effective set over mulch, you can additionally hide them with an extra layer of mulch over the top and more or less forget them.
Unlike conventional hoses, soaker hoses do not need to be brought inside in winter because their many perforations keep any water from being trapped in them. However, Herb says to take care when planting in subsequent seasons to avoid accidentally slicing through them with a spade or trowel. Barring any accidents, they can last for years.
Herb confesses that he has discontinued use of soaker hoses in the rose garden of his wife, Rhodora. Surface watering encourages roses to have shallow root systems when they are capable of developing long roots that can reach ground water. Instead, he has cut up PVC tubes into sections about two feet long, each one of which he has buried into the soil next to each rose bush — making sure they stay hollow and unclogged with soil. Once a week, Rhodora inserts the head of an ordinary garden hose into each tube until water bubbles up over the top. This can take 10 minutes during times of drought, she says.
For the past few years, whenever Rhodora yields yet again to temptation at a rose sale, her husband avails himself of a new planting technique that has proven particularly effective during the drought this summer. He has mixed hydrogels, aka water crystals, into the compost and bone meal placed at the bottom of the deep hole dug for each new rose. Water crystals are tiny super-absorbent grains composed of a network of polymers that expand when the soil is watered, releasing moisture gradually when the soil dries out. They can absorb 300 to 400 times their weight in water and last several years. Spent crystals can be replaced with new ones by placing them in deep pockets strategically dug near the roots of established plants. Herb warns me that merely spreading them on the surface of the soil is useless.
By the way, hydrogels are also used in disposable baby diapers and in bandages and wound dressings to absorb fluids. There has been some controversy over whether polymers might be carcinogenic, but as they are also used in some toothpastes and cosmetics, it would seem that we have more immediate areas of concern if they are. If you are worried that they might be environmentally unsafe for your vegetable garden, consider using hydrogels made with natural products like vegetable gums or coir (coconut husk fiber), rather than synthetic ones.
Please check the Hyattsville Horticultural Society website, hyattsvillehorticulture.org, for possible August events.
Miss Floribunda writes about gardening for the Life & Times. You may email her at Floribundav@gmail.com.
