Scott,

That's a sort of pitiful amount of rainfall for you of all people. What the heck has happened to your rainfall this year?

I am watching our radar and forecast closely and I definitely will pick tomatoes if rain is coming our way. I'm not going to sit and watch them split and crack either. We stil have one last hot and dry day to get through today although it won't be as hot as the previous 2 weeks.

We don't have a high chance of rain on any given day. I think maybe a 30% chance on a couple of days and less than that on others. I'm going to be optimistic and expect that it will rain, and that I, too, will be out picking every tomato at breaker stage and beyond. I hate the cracking and splitting, and the watered-down flavor, so I won't be taking any chances.

This week it hasn't rained and I haven't watered the tomatoes, so they've been able to vine-ripen under dry conditions which I much prefer, but I'll pick 'em early rather than letting the rain ruin them.

I hope everyone who's getting rain is enjoying it. I hope we'll soon be enjoying some too.

Rain or shine, we're gonna love the cooler temps!

Dawn

I picked my biggest watermelon yesterday. It wasn't ripe yet. ::sniff:: RIP, watermelon!

I put out a bucket to gage the rain and it has about a half inch in it, maybe a bit less. My rain gage has a bit over an inch though. The weather station in Owasso says they got .29". It doesn't look like we got more than an inch, so I'm inclined to believe the bucket. Our forecast is for more rain tonight, so perhaps that will do it.

We haven't had any rain here (Comanche County)since June 15, and most of those days have been WAY over 100. In June the total was 1.15". I am very fortunate that we live on a creek and have an electric pump to pull water for the garden. BUT, the creek is now almost dry; this will be the 3rd time in the last 10 years. It is spring fed. We are suppose to get rain tonight; we sure hope it is so! And I hope it falls on everyone after the tomatoes are picked!

Bella

My grandson and I have been out working this morning. We are still working on "re-claiming" my garden spot and extending it some. This morning we have been moving rock and raking up the dead stuff so we can burn. We, like Jay, got all of that thunder and almost no rain. If you look at the radar right now it looks like our entire county is getting rain, but we aren't. I think they are getting it on the south end of the county for sure, but we haven't had any more this morning.

If we get rain with no lightening, I may just be out there working in it. Right now our temperture is 76 degrees, but with the humidity at 73% I am wet anyway.

I was in Tulsa yesterday and drove down to see if Lisa had opened early, by any chance, so I could buy some tomato plants. She hadn't opened and from my vantage point it looked like they had just started to put the plants out. She still had the chain across the driveway and someone was shoveling soil out of a truck, and I'll bet they had a long day getting finished. LOL This was the first time I had been down there for a few years and it was easier to find. She has a sign out front, plus some signs saying when she will be open. The first time I went to buy from her Dad, it was much harder to locate since it wasn't marked so well.

I hope that I get to pick some up on Saturday. I only plan to buy a few, and actually put them in the ground. I will probably ask my DH to put up one cattle panel in the part of the garden that I have in "reasonable shape". I am going to plant a few fall things while I continue to work on other sections of the garden. My tomato cages are still around the spring planted tomatoes so I will have to improvise a bit.

I think that I will also plant some bush beans in the ground. I don't usually plant them for two reasons. Since my back doesn't bend, I can only pick them down on my knees and in the spring the ground is too wet to get down there. My DH and I have been discussing the possibility of building some raised beds in one part of the garden to handle the spring things. The soil needs to be improved in that area anyway so this would be a good time. Sometimes in the spring, I can't get crops in the ground because it is too wet, but later in the year it is fine. If I had a couple of above ground beds that I could cover, then I could probably start even earlier.

Although I am getting a few tomatoes and some banana peppers, and squash, it seems odd that I am not covered up with produce in mid July. My plants wouldn't win in beauty contest this year. This has been a strange year for sure.

Scot, I would probably pick before a rain if I had as many as you do. About half of my vines are Sungold so I don't have all of the pounds and pounds to worry about like you do. LOL It looks my big tomatoes are still setting fruit and this cooler weather should help a little with that. I guess I will just keeping picking fruit off my poor, ugly vines, as long as they keep pumping it out, and hope that my fall garden will be a little prettier.