I was real disappointed in several plants that I grew this year and I figured that it must be something that I was doing wrong; too little water, soil conditions, not enough fertilizer, whatever. There must be something that I was doing wrong. This was even more disappointing considering the amount of time I was spending in my yard. Well then something happened around the 1st of September when the temps began to fall. Yes it was still fairly hot but not the 90 plus that we had been seeing everyday for the past 2 months. Over the next few weeks my plants started to show a major comeback. Just when I was about ready to write everything off for the year it all started to look better. This was especially true with my Daybreaks, Salvia, Verbena (which I always heard loved dry hot weather) and my Million Bells. I remember that someone posted a photo of their Red Salvia on the forum and I kept thinking wow my Salvia doesnÂt even come close to that. Now over the last few weeks that's all changed (I have a great photo that I'll get posted once I get the film developed).

This has even more meaning when I look at my Verbena over the last 3 years.

The 1st year that I grew Verbena it did great, in fact it immediately became on of my favorite plants and I wondered why everyone did plant tons of it.

My 2nd year, last year, we had way too much rain early in the season and my Verbena was never able to completely recover.

Well this year, my 3rd year, it did poorly again and because I thought it liked hot dry weather I was about to just give up on it for next year. I kept wondering why I was able to grow it so easily the 1st year and now I haven't had anything good since. Well the last few weeks have answered that question because my Verbena now looks great. So IÂm wondering how many other plants I havenÂt given a 2nd chance because they just didnÂt do well that 1st year. In the past I would of figured that it had something to do with my soil or care and I would of probably just moved on to something new but now IÂm starting to wonder was the weather just not conducive to that particular plant that year? And this year was so hot and dry I donÂt think it was even good for plants that thrive on heat unless you were growing cactus.

So IÂm wondering did anyone else get the same thing when the weather changed?

Strouper