Did you plant tomatoe seeds? I would have, at this point, purchased any remaining tomatoe plants you could possibly find at places like Home Depot, Lowe's, or a nursery.

Onions - it may be too late for them, but maybe not. Did you plant seeds or sets?

Fennel should do okay. What kind of fennel, though - bulb fennel, or regular fennel?

Flowers should be heat loving flowers for now - like zinnias, cosmos, morning glories, salvias, amaranthus, coreopsis, hyacinth bean vine, cleome, black-eyed susan, ornamental grasses, coneflower, stuff like that.

In about a month you can probably start planting the cool weather veggies again. Somebody more familiar with vegetable gardening will surely pop in here and give you some suggestions.

Susan

Yeah, I planted tomato seeds. I could find NO tomato plants on my last foray out. I'm going to look again soon, and I am going to start some inside just in case.

I planted onion sets not seeds, so that should go ok.

I just went out and put in some watermelon, pumpkins, hubbard squash, cauliflower, broccoli and radicchio.

Yesterday, the flowers that I planted in the back of the garden were: zinnia, Texas bluebonnets, morning glories, foxglove, and sunflowers. In the front, I just planted some sweet alyssum and some nasturtiums. I thought that those would be very pretty next to each other.

I think I can get my paws on some pepper plants, and maybe some eggplant plants. I am planning on doing a winter garden, I did a bit of research as to what grows well here in the winter, but more info on that would be good.

This is my first real garden, so it's a big fat experiment. I also need to know how to replenish the nutrients in the soil. Seems I've got a lot to learn! This is a way different climate than I grew up with in Montana!

Mary

Texas Bluebonnets are usually early bloomers, so don't know if you'll get anything out of them this year - maybe next year. Sunflowers should be okay. Foxglove - don't know. Maybe too hot, and they need a cold period (stratification) in which to germinate, unless they got that by the company that sold them. Zinnias and MGs are fine for now.

Where are you at in Oklahoma? I live in OKC, and I have a couple of tomatoe plants (sweet 100; cherry tomatoes) that I could give you to plant.

Susan

I am in Geronimo. It's about 14 miles from Lawton. My husband is in the Army and we just came back to the states from Germany.

Thanks so much for the offer of tomato plants, that is so nice of you! It might be kind of far though! I suppose that it is legal to ship them in the mail though here. I am so used to not being able to get much through the post. I couldn't even order coffee beans when living in Germany!

My garden is really starting to hold moisture well. I think that I've got pretty good drainage though, and once the cardboard and newspaper that is under the soil I had trucked in decomposes, the earth will be cultivated to a good 12-14 inches. I have high hopes for a winter garden and for a really nice garden next year. I'm trying to learn as much as I can about winter gardening so that I put the right things in at the right times.

Any advice on that?

Mary

No, let's hope some of the veggie gardeners jump in here. I'm not a veggie gardener; used to be years ago, but no longer. I now garden for the enjoyment of it, and also garden to attract butterflies and moths. I grow host plants for them as well as nectar plants. My granddaughter is a big caterpillar fan, so when we find them on the host plants, she loves to watch them grow.

It's sounds like what you have done is create a "lasagne garden", by layering the cardboard/newspaper, then the soil, manure, mulch, etc. That's great! You have a fantastic start on your soil. The heat right now is a big stress factor on growing plants, and there's not much you can do about it until late July-August, when you can begin to plant your fall-winter veggies, except enjoy the flowers that you can and it seems like you've already planted.

One thing you can start planning for, too, is winter sowing. It is a fun project. Start saving your 2-litre soda bottles, water bottles, milk jugs, whatever, and start reading the FAQs on the Winter Sowing forum here. It is an easy, cheap way to start perennials and hardy annuals. I did it for the first time this year, with great success.

Susan

Some things that like heat and mature fairly fast (if kept watered)

Bush beans
Summer squash
Okra

(Eggplant if you can find it.. it take quite a while to start from seed. You would need plants.)

Well, I have a lot of little guys sprouting in the garden now. It looks like the sunflowers, zinnias, morning glories and holly hocks are up for sure. There is radicchio up, cauliflower, broccoli, the onion sets are shooting out green, the squash are starting to pop up, and the sweet alyssum along the edge is sprouting. I'm hopeful that as long as I keep watering like I have been that things will be okay! I was planting some dill yesterday and decided to look to see if any of the eggplant or tomatoes were sprouting. The eggplants are just starting to sprout and will come up in the next day or so. I have to do most of my watering at night so that the little guys don't get burned. I also planted some parsley, basil, and beets yesterday. Oh, and swiss chard. I figure even if those don't get too big, that's okay. We can eat the tender greens, and baby beets are a real treat. I am just going to make the most out of this garden and get a feel for things here so that I can have a splendid one next year!

Mary

Mary, your enthusiasm overwhelms me, and I feel like a happy gardener myself, even in this heat. Thank you for sharing it with all of us! And please, please come back and ask lots of questions and post your experiences with all of us. You're a joy to have around!

Susan

Ok, so this morning, the pumpkins are up, also some little bitty things that I don't know what the heck they are! I am suspicious that they might be the tomatoes, and I can sure see why I probably won't get a single one this year. They are about the size of an alfalfa sprout!

Susan, it's easy to be enthusiastic about finally having the opportunity to garden, because my husband and I have been married nearly 7 years and this is our first home that we have owned. And to top that off, the last three years were spent overseas in Germany in military housing with crummy neighbors and no space at all. So, just to be able to go and play in the dirt and see what happens is priceless.

I've decided though that I don't like two things about Oklahoma. The heat, and cockroaches! We do not have roaches where I am from, and I don't know what to do! We are meticulously tidy, have sprayed, etc., but every now and then a creepy crawler sneaks in and I'll find it on it's back in death throes. Is there any other way to cockroach proof your house? I'm not a fan of poisons either, so it's a big catch-22 for me!

On that icky note, I guess I'll go and play with my kids!
Any plants out there that cockroaches hate? Probably not. I've heard that they can live with their heads off for a period of time. Ugh. Ok, I've totally grossed myself out. Sorry for the vent on roaches.

Mary the best thing you can do about the roaches is go to the coop or walmart and get some spray and spray around the base of your house it will keep them out I haven't had to deal with them in years and we did this years ago and no problem since
also you may want to fix a shade to go over your tomatoes till the get up and strong I live in lawton and I have had to do this or the sun burns them when they are young
good luck with your garden
Bessie

Mary, welcome to Oklahoma! We moved to Tahlequah, from NJ, last summer, and we LOVE it here!

Our garden is also new, and I'm really working to keep expanding, breaking sod and removing stones. We're getting ahead, even of the Bermuda grass :)

About your tomatoes, I suspect you're going to be pleasantly surprised. I lost a plant of my favorite Prudence Purple, and direct seeded in that spot, on May 22. Now the plants are over 7" tall and growing like weeds. I can't see how we couldn't make tomatoes before frost. Just keep the soil moist until the plants are a couple of inches tall. I bet you'll get plenty of tomatoes. Bessie's suggestion about shade could also be a big help. I didn't do that, but then Geronimo is further South than Tahlequah.

George
Tahlequah, OK

PS. Pole beans still have plenty of time. If you can get seed I wouldn't hesitate to try it. When we moved in last August I discovered that one of my jars of bean seed was accidentally packed in the moving truck (which got really hot). I germinated about 15 seeds, just to see if they were any good. They sprouted, so I put them in the ground around August 15. We got two pickings before frost, which, for us was October 24.

Hey George, thanks a lot for the tip on the beans and the warm welcome to Oklahoma. We sure have had a nice day today. A lot of nice, gentle rain and relatively cool temperatures.

I can't wait to expand the garden into a combination of curved flower and vegetable beds. I plan on making raised beds in some areas and I'd like to do like my Grandmother did and plant things like grape hyacinths and some summer flowering plants around the tree trunks.

We also just bought a magnolia tree that I can't wait to get into the ground.

Well, I have to go. My daughter is begging me for a baby moose. lol

Mary

Send your granddaughter up here for a visit. Right now I have a rescued red-eared slider turtle, and a very happy fat toad living under the box that was built (before I moved here) to contain the hose. My granddaughter (4 1/2) got to see it for the first time last night and she was fascinated. I raise butterflies and moths, and she is my gardening buddy. She loves to watch the caterpillars grow and turn into chrysalids, then emerge as beautiful butterflies.

She also has a fascination for roly-polys. She collects them in containers and names them. She also pulls up weeds and replants them as "her" plants.

We planted a few of the cherry type tomatoes (sweet-100, and yellow pear), for her to eat - she loves those tomatoes. She transplanted them herself!

She has her own trowel and shovel and gardening gloves.

Susan

That's the way to start them out and make more gardeners!

My first garden was a result of eating watermelon while sitting in my sandbox, at age four. My folks helped me to nurture a vine and I got a ripe watermelon before frost. To my memory that was the best tasting watermelon in the world!

George

Susan,

My daughter and her two brothers are always after bugs too! But Aurora is constantly catching ants and naming them and wanting to bring them in the house and keep them. I think that it is something about being 4 years old!

Mary

I agree with you there. Every bug has a name and a house in her opinion. I don't know how many plastic containers I cannot find anymore. Just suffice to say that they aren't in my kitchen cabinets.

Susan