here is a down n dirty bridge Here is a link that might be useful:

My climate is pretty similar to yours, though sometimes your heat is a few degrees hotter than mine. Cowpeas will come up, bloom, and bear a crop in about 8 to 10 weeks. You will get 3 or 4 pickings over about a two week period, and then they will be finished. Because of this, I plant "patches" of them about a month apart until mid July (24 square feet of them, sowed 4 inches apart feeds 4-6 people with each picking). One caution, deer adore them, so provide protection, especially in late summer when the deer get tired of the stuff they're eating out in the wild. The Southern Living Garden Book says that blackeyed peas do better in California than in the southeast. But the pink eye purple hulls will do great for you. I love Zipper Creams too. Basically, any type of crowder should do well for you. Last year, I planted pole beans in early August and they bore very well until first frost in mid November. Any sooner than that and it might be too hot for them, depending upon the variety. (I planted Louisiana Purple Pod Snaps) It will be easier to get germination in the heat if you cover the row with fabric and keep it wet. With our heat, it's very difficult to keep uncovered soil consistently moist. Once they germinate, uncover them and keep them watered. They'll like a good mulch too. Next year, I have decided that my early crop of snap beans is going to be something that is heat resistant, like Rattlesnake beans. It got so hot so soon this year, that my Fortex beans quit producing after only 3 pickings. As the above posters said, July is a good time to start fall crops: collards and cabbage seeds can be started in pots (in dappled shade) in mid July. By mid August, you can direct sow broccoli, turnips, rutabagas, carrots and beets. By early September, you can sow kale and mustard greens, and set out your collards and cabbage plants. Since your climate is somewhat hotter than mine, you may be able to get a couple more weeks on these dates.

I love reading gardening books! My three that I reach for at the end of winter to get me going are: The Cottage Garden by Christopher Lloyd (its like the Bible of garden books for me) English Cottage Gardening for American Gardeners by Margaret Hensel (Tasha Tudor wrote the foreword) Front Yard Gardens Growing more than Grass by Liz Primeau Many of the plants are out of my zone but I just look at the pictures, read and get inspired. The Tasha Tudor book is amazing so if you like that you will love these. I think the Christopher Lloyd and Liz Primeau book are in paperback, the other one is a little pricey . Happy Reading!

I don't think there is a single "best" winter squash or pumpkin for a three sisters garden and I've grown all kinds. You should grow whichever one you and your family will enjoy growing and eating. Or, alternatively, you can raise corn and beans you'll enjoy eating and grow a decorative type pumpkin or winter squash for fall decorations. You could use sweet potato if you want, but I wouldn't really consider it a three sisters type of plant. One of the ways in which squash is an important part of the three sisters garden is that its large prickly leaves keep the racoons and other critters out of the corn, and the large leaves also shade the ground and keep it cool. You won't get exactly the same results from smaller sweet potato foliage. If I were growing a Three Sisters garden with kids, I'd probably grow either 'Seminole' or 'Small Sugar Pie Pumkin' because both of them are very disease-resistant and pest-tolerant. Of the two of them, 'Seminole' is the most drought-tolerant. If it is very important to you to grow your Three Sisters Garden using authentic vegetables once grown by Native Americans, you can find wonderful heirloom varieties online at NATIVE Seed/Search, Seeds of Change, Seed Savers Exchange, Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds or Southern Exposure Seed Exchange. If you want to read an interesting and informative book about exactly how the native Americans raised their crops, harvested and preserved them, and how they prepared them and ate them, I recommend the book "Buffalo Bird Woman's Garden", which I think is still available from Seed Savers Exchange or Seeds of Change. As far as gardening books, there are very few written specifically for Oklahoma. Steve Dobbs' "Oklahoma Gardener's Guide" focuses on standard landscape plantings.....lawn, trees, ground covers, perennials, vines, woody shrubs, roses, etc. It is a great book especially with regards to choosing landscape plants that will thrive in Oklahoma. I've never seen a vegetable gardening book written specifically for Oklahoma, but I have found most books written for Texas to work equally well for us here. My favorite vegetable gardening book is an "oldie but a goodie" published by Texas Gardening Press in 1985. It is called "The Vegetable Book" and was written by Texas A&M professor Dr. Sam Cotner, the former head of Horticulture at Texas A&M University. (I've linked the book below.) This book has been my vegetable bible for at least 20 years. There are a couple of other good vegetable gardening books written for a national audience that are useful in conjunction with Dr. Cotner's book. One is "All New Square Foot Gardening" by Mel Bartholomew, which will teach you how to build raised beds, enrich the soil and plant using his square foot methods to maximize your productivity. Another is Ed Smith's book "The Vegetable Bible: Discover Ed's High-Yield W-O-R-D System For all North American Gardening Regions". For general gardening info, any and all of Neil Sperry's books are wonderful. A professional horticulturalist, one-time Texas agriculture extension agent (when I was a kid), author, radio show host, businessman and all-around good guy, Neil Sperry is simply a treasure and his books should be on every Oklahoma gardener's shelf. His annual calendar and his magazine are amazing too. A great magazine that has lots and lots of info on raising veggies in our climate is Texas Gardener magazine. You can find it and subscribe to it by googling. It is my favorite gardening magazine. Don't forget that a great resource for veggie gardeners in Oklahoma is the University of Oklahoma fact sheets written to cover many gardening topics. If you don't know how to access the OSU fact sheets on-line, let me know and I'll link their index for you. Robert and Debra both made comments that are very kind and much appreciated, but I want to emphasize that we have many knowledgable and experienced gardeners here....and I am just one of them. You shouldn't hesitate to ask your questions here....you'll get much useful advice and even a few laughs from our many members. None of us is an expert at everything (or, maybe none of us is expert at anything, LOL) but together we're all experts at dealing with Oklahoma's highly variable (aka wild and crazy) climate/weather and soil. Dawn Here is a link that might be useful: Dr. Cotner's Book