Oh newbie, you poor thing. How disheartening. The only thing I can suggest is to provide your remaining plants with some shade if possible. I'm so very sorry.

Libby

I've had that experience before, starting a beautiful flowerbed then it all dies. So I feel your pain.

Do you have a garden center that may be selling good size plants in a pot that are already adapted to the heat?

Newbie, I just wanted to say that two of the plants you listed [columbine & lady's mantle], are usually done blooming by now anyway. I'm sure after all that heat, that they aren't looking too good, but I find even in a normal year, they can look unkempt about now. We've been very dry here too and I've been using the hose a LOT. The trees are so dry though, that they just suck up the moisture as soon as you water and it's dry again. If you can, I would give them a really long drink of water. Put the sprinkler on and leave an empty tuna can under the sprinkler to measure how much they are getting. I think my can holds almost 3 inches, I forget. I try to give them one inch a week if it's raining once in awhile and at least two inches if it hasn't been raining. If your ground is really dry and you have many trees, I would be tempted to give them a full 3 inches to get them back to moisture at a good depth. Especially if you have no rain in the forecast. We are expecting another heat wave here next week, so I'm hoping to keep watering a lot before it gets here. I'm sure you already know to water in the morning and not at night to avoid foliage problems. Especially in hot humid weather.

Of course, with what it costs for water you might have to think about using that much. If so, then choose the plants that need it most to get a good soaking and give less to the rest of the garden. Sometimes, I spot water by hand when something really needs it.

I usually cut my columbine leaves back to get a fresh crop of foliage after they bloom. Right now I am letting seed ripen but soon I will be trimming them all back. I try to leave any new good looking leaves on the plant and cut off the older unsightly leaves. They grow back very well for me. I haven't any experience with cutting back lady's mantle, but you might want to post a new thread and ask if anyone has. I wouldn't cut them back until you were sure you were going to be able to keep them moist until they grow back new leaves. I don't grow bellflower, sorry.

Libby had a good idea too. If it's really hot and sunny, the plants that look the worst, after you water them well, put a plastic milk crate over it for shade to give it a breather for a few days, or at least during the hottest part of the day when it is hot. You are in a warmer zone than I am.

Oh, I know where you are coming from. It's been so hot here too. I'm sorry about your garden!

I am really sorry to hear about your struggling plants. It is a tough spring and summer all around, I hear. I thought our spring was bad--it rained all of May and June. I lost some very established agastache and nepeta because it was just too soggy for them. My roses are shorter this year and have black spot early. Conversely, my filipendula and lysimachia have surged out of their assigned spots and are swallowing up some of their neighbors. They are somewhat aggressive, and I always have to pull quite a bit of them to keep them well behaved, and they usually are, but this year they have just loved all the wet. I also lost a new expensive bleeding heart--the one with the red hearts and bluish ferny leaves--the name escapes me now. And I also lost some supposedly hard-to-kill lamium.

Everything is a month behind schedule here. The local farmers have had a tough time with their berries and right now the strawberries are "on." Usually the plentiful wild raspberries and blackberries are at least beginning to ripen, but they are still in flower. I see all the pictures on the garden web and many of you have plants in bloom a month or so early and are struggling with unusually high temperatures. Very strange weather this year!

well I had a similar experience this summer but what I was told by my nursery that some of my plants "browned" because I was DROWNING them!!!

So that's something to consider also -- too much water. Now I dig with my finger at least 2 inches to feel the dirt and then water if it's very dry.

Unless the plants are browned thru and thru they might still come back next year. Some plants are really hardy. Crossing my fingers for you.

Thanks everyone, for your support. I think what also may have happened is that some areas that I was calling part shade are really mostly sunny once summer comes around. **sigh** Oh well, you live and you learn, right? And I also learned to plant in October, not May! (Of course when I do that there will be a freak frost). But I still love gardening :-)

Such a shame and so disappointing after all your efforts, is there anyway you could rig shade cloth or sheets to shade your plants until they get established. Who cares what it looks like if it saves your plants.

On the rare occasion and I mean rare, when the sun wilts some of the plants in one of my beds I hang sheets on a retractable clothesline that runs up the path in front of this particular bed shading it from the mid day sun. this really worked for me.

Annette

Wow Annette, you just gave me a great idea! I bought a new retractable clothesline and I haven't put it up yet. I'm going to see if there's any way to put it where it could come in handy like that. Thanks!

Make a temporary shade for them. You can use sticks or twigs or old broom handles - anything like that. Stick them in the ground and then drape an old sheet or large pillow cases over the tops of the sticks to make a tent. Secure it with twist ties, strings, or rubber bands so it doesn't blow off. You can put pots or buckets upside down over sticks for smaller plants. Leave space at the bottom for air to circulate. Don't use plastic bags. It heats up.

Anything you can use for shade will work. You can even lay pine boughs or tree branches with leaves over them. First, set a stack of bricks, rocks or heavy pots on each side and then lay the branches across the top over the plants to create shade. It may look ugly, but it will save your plants. They are in shock. As long as their roots are cool, they should be okay. Water alone won't do it because as the soil heats up, so does the water, so they "cook" in their own juices. Death will follow.

I use this method frequently when I set out plants and it is hot, or when newly planted things are suffering.

It is also something you can do for new or established tomatoes and other veggies when it turns too hot and they wilt or stop making fruit. It works!

Don't remove the shades until the heat is over and your plants recover FULLY.

~Annie

Newbie,
I know how you feel. I'm a newbie in South Jersey too and a lot of my plants aren't too happy. It seems we went from winter to 90F in a very short period of time... think Mother Nature skipped spring.

Newbie, don't give up. Sometimes it seems as if the weather is out to get us, but hopefully things will straighten out for you.
kay

Thanks for the advice. I have some weed cloth that I'm never going to use (another live and learn lesson) so I could use that, or do you think it would be hot? It's brown.

There's another, hotter heat wave on the way. ACK!

I feel your pain too. I'm not far from you, I'm near Allentown, Pa.
I haven't had any rain at my house in 2.5 weeks and the next chance is Tuesday through Thursday = Chance of Thunderstorms (not a good soaking rain, if anything it'll probably be strong pelting rain that lasts 30 mins if I'm lucky). I've been watering every 4-5 days...so far things seem to be tolerating it ok but the grass in the entire area is already brown. It's like August in June :(

~Andrea

Gardening is such a roller coaster - some days we are jubilant, some days we aren't sure why we bother. I sooooo understand!

As others have said columbine and lady's mantle indeed die back - my general rule in the garden is if it looks tattered and trashy for any reason cut it back and honestly it just nearly always works. Even if you sacrifice some flowers, the foliage grows back and looks good in a few weeks. If I have it handy I sometimes give a splash of miracle gro on them at that time - it works really well with things like cranesbill geraniums and daylilies. So before you yank anything as dead give it a cut back and it might be ok.

That hot weather is so hard on things and what doesn't die looks miserable. It is amazing though how things bounce back after it cools off - much of the time it really surprises me.

Your garden is new and probably not as resiliant - but that is one of the big pluses with perennials is that while you may have a bad year, they generally don't die and you can try again next year and hope Mama Nature cooperates! Hang in there, sister, we all understand....