I'm kinda, sorta saying this tongue-in-cheek but I do halfway mean it: I don't know if there is any vegetable that I dislike enough to torture it by planting it alongside the west wall of a house in our climate.

Without knowing if the house faces directly west or if there are other sources of heat/reflected heat like concrete driveways, patios, etc., it is hard to guess what might do well there. You might get away with planting almost any veggie along a west-facing wall in northern, central, northeastern or eastern OK, but perhaps not in southern, southwestern, northern or northwestern OK. A lot of it depends on your soil quality and annual rainfall. And, of course, in a very hot year like 2005 or 2006, plants on a westward facing wall might not produce well, but in a rainy year like 2004 or 2009, they likely would be just fine. Our climate and soils vary so much here that it is hard to say.

Tomato plants on the west side of a house probably wouldn't do terribly well in July or August, but a very large indeterminate type might provide enough shade to help cool the house while also producing fruit. Tess's Land Race Currant is one that comes to mind. Mine reached the top of an 8' tall tomato cage last year and then cascaded back down to the ground another 8'. Jet Star and Brandy Boy also reached that height easily last year and Sweet Million and SunGold were about 7' tall. They all produce well for me in full sun but they are not up against the west side of a building that's going to reflect heat onto them.

Black-eyed peas and okra both probably would tolerate a western exposure if the soil is fertile and well-watered, but are less likely to do well in that heat if you have rocky soil or heavy, dense clay soil as it might be hard in those conditions to keep them well-watered enough to tolerate the extreme heat.

If I was trying to shade a west-facing wall with annuals and was determined to use vegetables, I'd probably plant some the tallest variety of corn I could find and I'd plant it in April so it could make some good growth before the late June heat arrives. You'd need at least 4 rows though for good pollination, but could plant those 4 rows using 12-18"spacing in all directions. Then, I'd wait until the corn was growing well and had reached a height of 4' or so and would plant a tall monster of a southern pea like Mandy (aka Red Ripper) and let it climb the corn. You likely could only plant the southern peas on the row of corn fartherst from the house, but once they climbed to the top of those plants the southern peas likely would grow horizontally across the other rows.

Another option would be sunchokes, a double row of one of the really tall and sturdy okra plants like Cowhorn, or an ornamental planting of broom corn (you could make a broom after the havest!) interplanted with either purple hyacinth bean vines as an ornamental or with a very vigorous type of pole bean. You might not get good production from the pole bean until cooler temps return in the fall. Rattlesnake is one that produces well in very hot weather.

We handled our west wall the first couple of years by planting very tall types of sunflowers interplanted with morning glories and moonflower vines to cover them until the trees we planted were large enough to shade the wall. If the westward facing wall needs permanent shade, I'd only use the veggies as a temporary solution and would go ahead and plant my permanent solution knowing that shade still would be a few years away.

Dawn

My garden is on the south side of my house and I have one raised bed right up next to the brick. I planted pole beans last year with minimal success... the foliage was beautiful but very few beans. This year I am going to try peppers in that spot since they like heat and the bricks hold in a lot of heat. That is, unless some more experiemced gardener says otherwise :)

My house is not brick but is covered with concrete-board siding. I have one portion of my wall that is in full afternoon sun and I have a water faucet in that area. Last year I went over to get a pail of water and I put my hand on the house as I waited for the bucket to fill. My paint is light grey so it should reflect rather than absord. The wall was so hot that I couldn't hold my hand there. I was surprised by that. No plants would survive there, I am sure.

If I were trying to shade the wall, I would probably make a free standing trellis at least 6 to 8 inches away from the wall surface and plant pole beans. They will grow very tall and full and help to shade the house.

I have never grown Red Ripper cowpeas as Dawn suggested, but I understand they are very vigorous. I have a trellis that I use in the veggie garden that is made from half a cattle so it is about 4 feet wide, but stands 8 feet tall. I think I am going to place it in front of the air conditioner unit to provide some shade for it. I won't have it close, of course, but I think it would help to have it shaded a bit and I had thought of using pole beans.

My house is a little angled. The brick wall that I would like to grow some extra cherry tomatoes against is mostly West facing, but angled a tad to the North. It's in full sun. Do you think that shade cloth for part of the afternoon would help them continue to produce in the really hot months? I'm trying to squeeze in extra tomatoes anywhere that I can! :)
All of the cherries are indeterminate.

Dawn - Our house is in OKC, the west side face directly west, no driveway or patio near it, just the veggie garden several feet away. Deciduous trees would have been my first choice except for the garden nearby that I don't want to shade. Love the "not a vegetable I dislike enough to torture it on a west wall" but considering the overall poor results from my garden last year...you'd have thought I disliked them all...yikes! Our okra produced the best...probably why I thought it might be tough enough for the west wall. Love corn but is it for beginners? Like the idea of growing peas or something with it. Maybe I could try throwing in a tomato just to see. I'd like to try sunchokes too...think I've read they are very nutritious. Do you think I could find them locally?

Okiefamily - Good luck with the peppers...let us know how it works out.

Soonergrandmom - Pole beans did not do well for me last year and I really wanted them to because my DH especially likes them. I'll try again though and our AC is on the west side so I may try them there.

Laspasturas - Tomatoes are the favorite around here and I didn't even have good luck with them last year...so I might try throwing an extra one in there. Shade cloth is a good idea to keep in mind!

Thanks everyone for your help!

Cindy

Okiefamily, Last year was a difficult bean year for a lot of us and I blame it on the weather, so don't know if your wall/heat gave you additional issues or not.

I think peppers will be fine as long as they are hot peppers and not sweet peppers. No, that's not an attempt at a joke. Hot peppers will set fruit even in extreme heat (sweet pepper production slows down in heat) so they'd likely go right on producing even alongside that hot wall. However, the reflected heat could sunscald (that's the garden word for sunburn) the peppers themselves. Watch for a light spot on the peppers that first appears as fading color and then enlarges and turns brownish-white. That's sunscald. If you start seeing sunscald on the peppers, rig up a sheet or something to shade them part of the day.

Carol, I like the trellis idea. I am not entirely sure how far Red Ripper will run if you let it go as far as it wants, but I'm planning to plant it to climb a 2-story trellis this year and find out. I've heard it can go at least 18' and I know they are really vigorous, but I've never let them run as long/tall as they want before.

Megan, Cherries might be fine on that wall. In fact, earlier in the season it likely will help them make great growth. I wouldn't worry about even the possibility of shadecloth until late June. At that point, just watch them and see if they are growing 'normally'. If you see signs of heat stress, like blossom drop (rare in cherry types) or wilting of the foliage, then you could rig up a shade cloth for them. They might never need it, or they might. Hard to guess and think a lot depends on this coming summer's rainfall and temps.

Cindy, Glad you saw the humor in my torture comment. LOL

Corn is easy as pie. A nice dense planting of a tall corn variety would shade that wall nicely and you could grow the type of corn of your choice....an heirloom or OP type with old-fashioned corn favor, an older hybrid sweet corn with normal sweet corn flavor, a newer supersweet or synergystic hybrid type, a popcorn, an ornamental broomcorn, a dent or field corn, or an ornamental corn. That's a lot of choices! The only real issue that might arise is that if there are too many sheds or garages, other buildings like a neighborning home, privacy fences, etc. near that west wall, then air flow might be impeded and that might impact pollination. If the rest of the veggies pollinate just fine on that side of the house, then I'd imagine corn would too.

Last year was a really difficult gardening year because we had all the wrong weather at all the wrong times. I wouldn't judge myself as a gardener based on last year's garden performance. Just blame it all on the weather.

I don't know if I've ever seen sunchokes locally, but you could order them online. I think tomatoes are a possibility if you just watch them carefully. Do you have a specific variety in mind, because if you don't, some of us who grow tomatoes in hot locations could list our best heat-loving tomatoes. : )

Okra might do well alongside that wall. I've never tried it on a west-facing wall but it certainly doesn't mind the heat anywhere else I've ever grown it. In fact, since okra needs heat to perform, you might get earlier okra pods along a hot wall so it could be a perfect 'match'.

You could be our official hot west wall researcher and try 2 or 3 different plants along that wall and see which performs best for you there. We'll all be eagerly awaiting your results.

Dawn

Cindy,
I think I remember someone on this forum saying that they used wet bedsheets to cover tomatoes in containers on the really hot days. Was that you, Dawn? I think I'll probably plant as many cherries as I can fit over there and find some garage sale sheets to keep around in case they get too hot. It might work for other veggies on those 100+ days, too.

Dawn,
Oh, you know that I HAD to order Tess's Land Race after seeing your description...we have a shed that they can crawl all over.

-Megan

Megan,

I've never used wet bedsheets. Most of my tomatoes are in the main vegetable garden where they get sunlight from sunrise until sunset, although sometimes I plant some in that garden's northwestern edge, in which case the shade from the big old pecan tree begins shading them around 3 p.m.

It is my tomatoes in containers that needed shade in the past, so on days the temps exceeded 105, I might shade them with a sheet clipped across the tops of the cages with clothespins. Those were on the south and southwest side of the barn/garage and got a lot of reflected heat off that building.

Last year I moved the containers further east and north so they are shaded for part of the morning, until around 10 a.m., by our two story house and a couple of trees. They get sunlight from about 10 a.m. until about 6 p.m. and that was just perfect last year. The rest of them are in a spot where they get sunlight from 8 a.m. until about 3 p.m. and that worked too.

So what I'd suggest is that you watch your tomato plants once they are in the ground and jot down (I do this on a calendar) what time the sunlight first begins hitting the plants, and what time the sunlight stops hitting the plants. Anything between 6 and 8 hours in our climate is plenty during the summer months. Although tomatoes are often said to need full-sun all day long in order to ripen and flavor up properly, I've learned that's not true in very hot parts of the country like ours. Here, they generally get enough sunlight and heat in only 6 to 8 hours instead of 10 or 12 or 14.

With the reflected heat/light coming off the wall of the house, your plants may show heat stress after only 4 or 6 hours on a hot day, but they may not show any at all. Tomato plants tend to adjust pretty well to where they are planted, I'd go ahead and start watching for garage sale or yard sale sheets, buy them and build up a supply, and then just watch the plants and let them tell me when they are feeling heat stressed.

How much heat can tomato plants handle? A surprisingly high amount if they are growing in good soil and have good moisture (not too much, not too little). I've learned that their performance in heat is linked not just to the heat but to the humidity as well.

During our first couple of years here, southern OK had serious drought and temperature issues. I had six Better Boy tomatoes in a raised bed where they received full sun from dawn to dusk. During a week when our daily high was between 105 and 112 (officially) to 113 (unofficially) and our nights were between about 80 and 84 or so, they were blooming and setting fruit like mad and were not dropping blossoms during the hot days and were not wilting. That behavior on their part totally defies logic and everything we supposedly know about tomatoes and heat. I was baffled for years about how that happened, until I read repeated postings on the Tomato Forum from Carla in Sac (Sacremento) that said she gets great fruit set in high temps all summer long and she attributes that to low humidity. Based on what I've seen happen here in a couple more drought years, I see what Carla sees. So, your plants may do surprisingly well in what would seem to be killer conditions.

Megan, If you'd said you wanted to grow Tess's, I would have sent you seeds!

Dawn

Ah, I knew I should have asked here first!
It was an impulse buy. I was ordering a few more beans to make sure that we'll have enough and tossed it into the cart at the last minute.

the high humidity causes the pollen to 'stick' to itself and is unable to pollinate the flowers and drop fruit. Last year we had very high humidity and so I hand pollinated the blooms as i passed by my toms. I also trimmed up my leaves at the base of all my toms so that the leaves would not get alot of splash on them. I dunno, thats just what i tried since it was so humid and rainy last year.

I hand-pollinate by giving each cage a good little shake during periods of high heat/high humidity. There are lots of interesting methods people use to help Mother Nature with the sticky pollen issue during those periods of time.

Some folks thump each flower, but with well over 100 plants in the spring garden, I don't have time for that.

Neil Sperry used to recommend that gardeners walk down their garden row with a tennis racket in their hand and give each cage and good whack as they walk by.

Some folks on the tomato forum use an electric (rechargeable, so no extension cord needed) toothbrush to 'buzz' the flowers, but it seems to me that would be practical, timewise, only with a small number of plants.

For those of you not familiar with pollination and fertilization issues, they generally occur once the daytime highs are exceeding 92-95 degrees and the overnight lows are exceeding about 72 degrees. If you're having hot days but still having cool nights, pollination usually occurs during the cooler hours as long as there is sufficient wind movement.

Temperatures above 95 degrees can render pollen sterile and that is where shading comes in. If you shade your tomato plants during periods of higher heat so the plants themselves stay cooler than 95 degrees, the pollen remains viable. Many people shade their tomato plants with purchased shade cloth or Aluminet (a fancy, expensive shadecloth), but bedsheets, sheer curtains and lightweight row covers can shade the plants enough to prevent the sterile pollen issue. You want to position your shade cloth where the plants are protected during the worst heat of the day, but still get adequate sunlight the rest of the day. Some people mist their plants in the early morning hours to keep them cooler a little longer for the sake of pollen viability, but I don't like doing that...any water on the foliage at all can lead to diseases.

Dawn