Oh Cameron, I do feel your pain. My yard has never looked this bad. Weeds everywhere and just to hot to get out and pull them up. My iris are turning brown and look horrible. I am just about to the stage where I tell my husband to just mow it all down. It really looks pitiful.
But on the other side, my dianthus,black-eye susan, budlia, roses,zinnias and salvias are still hanging in there and blooming good in spite of the heat and no rain.
It has got to get better soon.
Barb

Oh I so understand how you feel. I don't even have the oppresive heat that you have been having but the heat we did have was devastating to me and made everything bloom too fast. My job has been so hard lately that it is just too much for me to get out in the garden once I get home. So much needs to be deadheaded that I turn a blind eye. We had rain but now it's all dried up and everything is crying for water. And to make matters even worse our night temps are down in the 40's so I don't know if things will make seeds for me to harvest or if they will just give up and think it's too late. My buddleias are just starting to bloom and the asters that are volunteers from last year are beginning to get pretty. I don't have lantana, wish I did. I am pretty discourage but am hoping it will pass soon. We go on vacation next week to visit grandchildren so that should make me happier.

Bonny

I have been admiring the pictures showing the result and promise for all your hard work, Cameron. Fingers crossed for rain starting Sunday!

Hang in there folks! This is what is known as the late August blues (or browns?) I got it at the very beginning of the month as our drought started in late June, but I hung in there for July and watered and watered. Now the past week I have mushrooms growing everywhere and killed a 2" slug (first one I've seen in 3 years!) Rain hasn't stopped and weeds are now 12" tall, deadheads are all wet and everything is lying on the ground including sunflowers. Guess there is no happy medium, if there was, I'd likely be nuts. I think I'm ready for fall, and a rest!
Faye in MD

We can't water! That's the big problem, for us in the South East the drought has been going on for a long time, even last year was dry.
I'm trying to water when I can, but tonight I'm too tired and I fear I'm loosing all my Styrax, now so lovely, in the front yard.
Cameron, at least your lavender is OK. Mine is all dying. I've watered it a bit, but this is too much heat for too long!

girlgroupgirl

Cameron and everyone else,

I can echo your feelings. I too have so much weeding and trimming to do but just can't take the heat so its all waiting to be done. Then last week when I was mowing the grass I thought I spoted a snake in one of the flower beds. That does it...now I really have to force myself to go out and even water my containers. It was probably a harmless garden snake but I'm nuts when it comes to snakes.

The drought has played havoc with so many of my plants.

The Rudbeckia looked like someone took a match to all the leaves and I've wacked it down.

The Black and Blue Salvia was a disaster this year. Its cut to the ground already.

All the dwarf Phlox is gone.

The purple coneflowers look terrible. The list goes on and on.

On the bright side however, my ornamental grasses look great and the Sweet Autumn Clematis is blooming like a champ.

I don't remember it ever being this hot and dry for so long. Weeds don't seem to mind it however.

Tomorrow's another day...hang in there everyone.
Vikki

I've had times as you've described , Cameron. I desperately tried to keep plants alive to no avail.

We're having a mild summer this year but that's not to say it won't get bad in September and October.

On the other hand we had a severe winter. No rains and terrible frosts inilated everything. I lost so my precious plants. My most favorite Brugmansia that bloomed continuously and was a good 7' tall is now a meer 8" tall. I miss the sweet fragrant blooms that that perfumed my garden every evening.

I'm trying to stay cottage but with a emphasis on native plants that do well in my area. I also keep a journal on what worked and what didn't.

Hoping for cool breezes and rains to come your way.

Edna

Cameron,I sure wish I had lavender.I lost the few plants I had.My best bloomers this year has been silene,bachlors buttons,blanket flower and now sweet autumn clematis is gorgeous.My red bed is still gorgeous with castor beans,zinnias,amaranthus,salvias,petunia.dahlias.That is the one bed that gets watered-no matter what.We have rain in the forecast for the next 7 days.Sure hope the guys are right on that.I have tomatoes out the kazook this year too.I could complain but all in all,I still enjoyed my gardens.Now to just get some lavender.What kind are you growing?
moonphase

Ditto

We too got a ton of rain last night but it was a little too late for my garden. Even my ever faithful lantana was looking so bad that I hacked it down. It might have been lace bugs or both the heat and the bugs. My asters fried and they were my second favorite thing in the garden. Even my yarrow is starting to look a bit parched and hasn't flowered since early summer. The morning glory hasn't flowered and is constantly wilting despite my efforts to try and keep it watered. Even my bushes wilt. My poor sweet hens are panting and holding their wings out to try and cool off. I actually put a box fan out for them to at least circulate the air. They love it though and sit right in front of it with their little feather blowing in the breeze. :O)

It sure has been a tough summer and the news said the south east looks to be a dry winter! UGH! Boy when your drought tolerant plants are having a hard time making it what's a gardener supposed to do? Ya know I have never had any luck with lavender but maybe now is the time to try it!
Meghan

15 days over the 100 mark here....it was 108 at 4 PM yesterday...not heat index that was how hot it was. Will be 105 today. No rain...we had that little .6 " and that was that. We are 24 inches too low.

My Provence Lavender in pots is in bloom and looks great, Jasmines and Sweet Olives are all fine. Azaleas both those watered and not are OK. Red Maple is crispy and losing all its leaves. Hostas are ragged and yellow. Bluestones are doing very well. I water them 2x a week. The penstemons are growing like crazy. I had never heard of them before. All of the plants are in AM sun only ...that is probably the key...I didn't plant in full sun since I don't have any. I bought 5 books from Amazon on gardening..."Tough PLants for Southern Gardens" , Gardening with Natives" and others of that type. I am determined to do better next year.

I hope everyone gets some relief soon. But just look at Ohio...8 ft in their homes and TX. Crazy. Caroline

I am losing plants right and left this year - I am really hoping that it is just the upper parts dying and that next year they will come back from the roots - time will tell. We have been able to do some watering from the well but when your state is in a 25" rain deficit the ground is just bone dry way down so top watering does nothing. We really need (dare I say) a tropical system to hang around for several days. Weeding has gone by the wayside so I will have to cope with even more weeds next year because of the seeding. I have wanted to revamp some beds so I think this may just be the fall and winter to do so.

My one bright spot is the $138 daylily order I got a couple weeks ago is still doing good and I even have one bloom - of course they have been getting special attention and I did put them all in a holding bed. Also the birds finches especially are enjoying the dry parched seed heads so I guess that is a good thing too. At least we are not flooded like parts of the country are. My prayers go out to you who are......

Lynne

I am so frustrated. I have lost my Jacob's Ladder, petunias, geraniums, hosta, ferns and my huechera have crispy leaves.

My new maple trees leaves are turning brown around the edges. I have been watering it because I hate to lose a tree but it doesn't seem to help.

We have rain predicted for the weekend so I am keeping my fingers crossed.

faye

My garden looks like a battlefield. Dead bodies everywhere. Plant cemetery...
Lavender is one of very few that still looks good. Rosemary is holding on. The best one to my surprise is Sedum Autumn Joy. Survives with no water, expands in size and blooming.
I have planted so many gardenias, roses, camellias this year - and most of it is dead or dying. No point of watering it anymore, though we are allowed to water just once a week.
~Natalie

Thanks for listening. We're all hanging in there even if our plants aren't doing well in these challenging gardening times. As I mentioned on the Carolina Forum, gardening is not for whimps! We hang tough in spite of all kinds of challenges that nature throws our way.

Then, there are the poor folks with all the flooding in the mid-west. Hope all our CG Iowans and Ohioans (is that the right term) are doing okay. The photos of the destruction -- frightening.

We had a just a tad bit more rain overnight. It's cloudy and that's a huge (although humid) relief. Maybe this pattern will soon break. Our well is holding up, but I only water the potted plants and the drip irrigation for selected sections.

Take care.
Cameron

I'm making note of what is doing well in this weather and am just going to plant more of it. This weather trend doesn't seem to be reversing itself. (Not that I mind the milder winters up here...)

I have resolved, anyway, to plant less "one-ofs" and go to larger swathes of the things that I like. In a bizarre way, this actually lets me have MORE beds for less work, since there are less spaces between plants for weeds to get into. Should also help with moisture loss, since a large clump of the same plant will act as its own mulch (again, because there are no spaces in-between). It's a theory, anyway.

So, the things that are doing brilliantly in this heat: Canna lilies, lavender, coreopsis (I have baby sun and zagreb), sedum autumn joy, liatris, veronica, BES, ornamental grasses (oddly enough), dianthus (blooming or not), any of the stone crop sedum (will expand the rock garden), peonies. Among the annuals, the zinnia and golden oregano are doing just fine.
My dwarf weigelas are looking just fine, too. Tucking them into the perennial beds keeps things looking lush when it really isn't.

I am going to give up on adding more daylilies. While I like them, their yellow bottom leaves just look shoddy.

Well there is good news and bad news,

the good news is that no part of iowa is under a drought listing anymore yay!

the bad news is that almost every part of iowa has at least some flooding with some portions having major flooding.

There is a town about an hour north of me that has gotten over 15 inches since last friday. our average for the month is usually around 3 - 5.

The strange weather system continues.....

I just wanted to tell all of you with crispy heucheras that, because of drought last year (it did not rain in Portland, OR from about June 3 until September 13 or so), I, too, had lots of crispy heucheras, and this year they came back fine! Here's hoping yours do, too! :)

I am so sorry to hear this sad news about many of your gardens. I do hope you get some relief and soon!

I think Chris has the right idea - take stalk in what is doing well and plant more of the same. A cottage garden can look beautiful with a handful of steady, tried and true bloomers, and will be much more rewarding in the long run. I stopped trying to grow lots of different bloomers about a decade ago. In my clime most anything will grow but we have intense sunlight and lots of wind at this high elevation so some things that are very thirsty just have to live in someone else's gardening world. : )

I'm also wondering how long some of the plants that you all are losing have been in the ground. Most perennials, including roses, need at least 3 years to really become well established. First year plantings need deep watering at least 3 times week, a good mulch and often sun protection. You really can not skip this routine if you want to get them off to their best start and well established. And don't go heavy on the fertilizer - let their roots get settled in and you will be rewarded with plenty of blooms in the second or third year. i know, that requires a lot of patience but it sure beats replacing plants over and over.

For now, I would cut things back to about 6 inches and mulch, mulch, mulch. Also, water deeply at the plants base. Standing with the hose over the plant for several minutes is not deep watering - you have to put the hose at the base and let it go for at least one hour, maybe longer. If you can't water like that then I suggest using much more drought tolerant plants, or even rethinking what type of garden is better suited for your clime.

Bottom line - cottage gardens are not labor intensive. The most you should have to do once they are established is deadheading and some weeding. If you're doing more than this, you're trying to have a style of garden not suited to your environment, imho.

I wish you all the best but don't beat yourselves up if you have to go with a different style of gardening. I love my cottage gardens but if I had to go more native tomorrow I would. Well, maybe I'd still try and save the roses. :)

Diana

My garden was in a severe drought situation about 3 years ago. That was a awful Summer - temperatures above 40C for days on end, after a Winter with very cold temperatures (by our standards) with hardly any rain. Mind you, it's normal here not to have rain at all for a good 3 to 4 months in a row (June to September), so this is not what I mean. We are talking about heat wave after heat wave, with no respite in sight. Wild fires everywhere. It was a nightmare. So I know what you're going through - you have my sympathy.

In the end, the few herbaceous perennials I had at the time didn't make it, but the shrubs, trees and roses were surprisingly undamaged. I did continue to water regularly, though, throughout that whole Summer. Otherwise they wouldn't stand a chance of surviving. To this day, even this year when we are having a very mild Summer, I reuse all the water I can from the kitchen to use in the garden. A plastic bowl lives in my kitchen sink from Spring to Fall and all the water used to clean vegetables, fruit or simply washing one's hands, gets faithfully collected and thrown in the garden. If the weather is very hot, the runoff water from the shower - the one we waste because it's still cold when we open the tap - is collected into a bucket and used to water the trees or plants which need additional water. Once you get in the habit of doing that, you'll be surprised at the amount of water you are able to gather and reuse for the garden's benefit.

Wishing you all the best through these drought/flood times.

Eduarda

I just read an article in the paper about saving your air conditioner condensation water. the author attached a rain barrel and filled it in a few days. Enough to keep important plants watered.

Mine drains into a rose garden trellised up the wall, and it keeps those roses supper hydrated. I also collect water at the kitchen sink, I get about a 4 gallons a day and put it on my hydrangeas. And if I'm really ambitious, I take a few watering cans and buckets up for while I warm up my shower, or to empty out my kids' baths.

If I could capture all the gray water I waste, my yard would be the garden of eden.

since i started this garden 4 years ago I really focused on xeric plants, most of these are doing very well. they include rosemary, sage, thyme, stipa, northern sea oats, catmint, georgia blue speedwell, pomeganate, chives, weigelia, buddlea, palms, osmanthus, lorapetalum, lambs ears, spirea, caryopteris, eucalyptus, lavendar, veronica, st. johns wort, holly, hazelnut, santolina, cast iron plant, candy tuft.

I water my roses on sundays some of the time, and hydrangeas get sink water and from basement dehumidifyer.

It's harder than the hose to be sure, I'm already planning what to move to wetter parts of the yard.

Harriet

wonbyherwits,
We were just talking about this Wednesday at our gardeners' gathering and talked at length about making future planting decisions based on this (so far) dry year. I will be rethinking clematis in my zone. I have a friend who simply *does not* water anything that's not in the process of getting established and then she will only carry water from her water barrels to do it. She has a strong conviction that we should not be using drinking water to keep plants and lawns alive. I have to admit, I'm not quite to that point yet, but my views are changing.

On the bright side, there are tons of plants that we can grow that don't require the moisture that others do.

Because it has been so intolerable to work outside I have been doing a ton of reading, researching and studying gardens lately that use more and more ornamental grasses as the backbone of the garden and thinking of heading in that direction. I have way too many gardens that I try and maintain the 'cottage' garden look and think it is time to scale back on that. I will still have my roughly 30x30'fenced in cottage garden but most of the perimeter beds will go to more shrubs and grasses with a scattering of drought tolerant flowers. Our state needs roughly 25" of rain to get out of the drought - by the time we make that up I will be getting too old to maintain 20 different 'flower' beds anyway - lol. Grasses start easy from seed so that will be my first project and they get established rather quickly. I will always dream of that lush full tumbling cottage garden look but will be willing to settle for it to be in one place and concentrate on making that corner of my little piece of paradise the best ever if this is the way our climate is headed. I am still thinking this is just an off year but it won't hurt to be more water conscience regardless of what next summer brings....

Lynne

I know you have heard of the flooding in TX this summer, but did you know that we are still under watering restrictions. See below:

"The Time of Day water use restriction prohibits irrigation water use between the hours of 10 a.m. and 6 p.m. This time period is when temperatures are the highest and much of the water utlized by sprinkler systems is lost to evaporation."

This restriction really promotes the use of natives, and drought tolerant plants in our area as well as the wise use of water.

As much as my eyes drift towards non-native species, through trial and error ( lots of errors! lol ) I am narrowing down the list of plants that are bullet proof as far as my climate and soil conditions are concerned and will concentrate on them.

Of course, mother nature has her own ideas, too. Just think of my experience with horrendous drought followed by floods. Frankly, I am amazed I have anything growing at all!!

Marilyn

Lynne,

I have a separate grass bed - dh would agree to that instead of some sod there :)

i have a large variety in a fairly small area, maybe 4x20?

reed feather grass
dropseed
blue festuca
blue eyed grass
porcupine/zebra grass
and several others whose names escape me right now!

I water them for the first few weeks and then i leave them alone. i watered them all once or twice at most while we were in the grips of the 98 degree/ 108 degree heat index, and they never faltered.

Melissa

Hi,

Finding this thread very interesting. I am in the Northeast and I had heard of flooding in the midwest, but didn't realize the southeast was having heat and drought conditions. So sorry to hear that. It seems to me, you normally have high heat, so it must be very hot if you are noticing it more than usual. Having spent some time in Florida, I just can't imagine what it is like in that heat, with no rain. As a matter of fact, I love the rain you get in Florida. Coming down in torrents and then stopping in a few hours and the sun is back out, with everything steaming. Just love that.

We have also had drought this summer, but not even as much heat as we normally get in a growing season. My tomatoes are half the size they usually are and nothing happening with any of the warm season crops. So glad I decided to forgo the peppers this year.

I have tried to add natives to the yard, and drought tolerant, low maintenance plants to the yard over the years and thankfully some of those plants did fairly well this year. That is not easy to do in the Northeast though. At least with the drought tolerant plants, like lavender. Usually drought tolerant plants prefer sandy soil and most of the northeast is clay. I try to offset that by raising many of my beds some and add compost to the beds.

Then we have unpredictability to deal with. Last year, I swear I might have set the sprinklers twice the whole growing season. Lots of rain and frequently enough that I barely had to water anything. The drought tolerant plants in the yard didn't look as good as they do this year? The grass looked the best it had ever looked. Huge amounts of mildew etc though. This year, I have never seen zinnias so clean of mildew. Even the tomatoes are much better in that respect than usual.

We are really pressed to water everything this year. We had a total water ban for the month of June and nothing was looking good at all. We could use a watering can but that was all, so I tried to give everything a little drink, but I just couldn't do everything. Most things survived until we were back on rationed water, every other day.

My yard does not look very good right now either. The grass is brown, and I have lost some plants but most things will survive for next year. The full sun area seems to be doing the best actually. The shade area..is near tree roots and even running the sprinkler for an hour and a half, the next day the hydrangeas and hosta can start drooping by late afternoon again.

What is doing well...
Butterfly Bush...had some yellowing leaves but bloomed fine
Pennisetum Hamelin grasses look excellent
Zinnia don't seem to mind at all
Coneflowers did ok but between the dryness and the critters, they have not had a blooming or increasing year at all.
Dianthus did fine with some supplemental water
Iris like the dryness and seem fine
Cosmos still looking okay..with some supplemental water
Lavender did pretty well too
Penstemon did well and produced a bumper crop of seeds
Ninebark shrubs don't seem to have been bothered at all...Dart's Gold and Seward's Summer Wine.
Knock Out Rose...didn't do as well as last year, but looking respectable. Foliage looks good and did get bloom
Meidland white rose...surprised at how well this one is doing. It was planted in late June in a heat wave when we were still having drought and a water ban. So I had to shade it for 10 days straight and water daily with a watering can. It managed without noticing really. Slowed down it's bloom for about 3 weeks, but now is pushing out new stems and plenty of buds and the foliage looks really really great.
Shasta Daisy seedlings added in June, barely noticed the drought. No yellowing leaves, blooming intermittently in their first year. The short varieties of Becky and Snowcap, just love them. In that same bed with the Meidland, plus lantana, penta, dianthus, silver mound artemesia, portulaca, a grass, some million bells. Not one plant there has shown any sign of stress and has gotten less water than the rest of the garden. Little bits of watering can water when it was really hot and the sprinkler was set twice all season. I am hoping to plant the same next year. It is a full sun bed from sun up to sun down.
Tropical Hibiscus, Dahlias, Four OClocks, Nierembergia Purple Robe in pots...all seem to be doing fine with an occassional miss on the watering schedule.
Hosta Guacamole...wow, what a surprise this was! It took the drought better than some of the native drought tolerant plants and it is in quite a bit of sun. No wilting, one little brown edge on one leaf and with very little supplemental water, it sailed through and bloomed and grew three times larger than last year.
California Poppies...my first time growing them. Did great!
Epimediums are practically indestructible in the shade.
Nepeta Walker's Low..wow, what a trooper that plant is. LOVE it!

What hasn't done as well...
Hydrangea wilting every other day, needing most of the supplemental watering. Love them and will keep watering them by hand if I had to.
Oakleaf Hydrangea, especially, has brown edges on all the leaves and looks horrible. Need to mulch it heavier next year and hopefully put a soaker hose around the base or something.
Surprisingly, Asclepias and Joe Pye Weed in their second year, showed wilting and yellowing leaves with the lack of water. They showed more of a problem then the Knock Out Rose and the Butterfly Bush near them.
Hosta Frances William, hates the heat and drought. Looks awful
Hosta Patriot was a small plant that barely came back this year and what did come back just disappeared at some point.
Dicentra King of Hearts..it was a very pretty healthy looking plant that I added in June to a very shady border, and I watered and watered and watered it because it was so dry looking all the time and it kept losing leaves. I can barely see a little remnant of it. It is supposed to be one of those dicentras that bloom all summer.
Sambucus shrubs...the dark and the light one, did not like this weather this year and looked great last year.
Viburnum Maresii..wilts at the first sign of drought
Ferns...had a tough year, although 'Ghost' seemed to do better than the others.
Heucheras had a rough year and none of them look very good.
Sedums, don't really look their best this year, surprisingly, I don't know if it is the drought or they just need dividing.
In the containers, nicotiana didn't fare well at all.

Sorry to be so long...hoped something I might have to report might help someone trying to decide what to try next year.

:-)
pm2

Cameron, Most definitely feel the pain of heat/drought. My 30 year old hydrangea has brown curly leaves, the garden phlox looks like it is dying also, it's a never ending battle of watering twice a day without it helping much. My veggie garden is doing ok, tomatoes and okra and cowpeas making it but didn't produce like they should.. Blackeyed Susans and sunflowers are doing well though.....just hope they don't implament water restrictions. If they do, I'll have to hang it up :(

We are on water restrictions every year regardless of what the weather is, it starts in june and ends the end of september. We can water every other day but not between the hours of 10 A.M. and 4 P.M. Odd number days or even depending on one's house address. We rarely have to worry about our water reserves it's to keep the water pressure up for any type of emergency that might need arise. Last year our restrictions started a month earlier because of a lack of snow in the mountains the winter before, but everything evened itself out.
It seems no matter where one lives we all seem to have our own set of challenges to deal with, all different but still extremely frustrating.
I guess we gardeners are just going to have to roll with the punches, I think the day has come when we aren't going to be able to push the limit to what we can grow, and grow only things that can take what old mother nature is throwing at us. Well maybe we can sneak in one or two things when her back is turned.
Maybe we can all synchronize our watches and send old mother nature a collective vibe for next year. Wishful thinking on my part me thinks, but I will be wishing you all a fabulous garden in 2008.

Annette