Thank you Socalgal - I guess that is what we are worried about, is even rain collection can only be beneficial if you get enough rain to collect. Clearly if we end up getting fractions of an inch that seems like a non solution. But - right now - we are still getting enough rain when it does rain to fill the rainbarrels. I had an almost empty rain barrel the last time it rained and it was filled to overflowing in 5 mins flat. Today I didn't even put the diverters down because my 2 rain barrels are full.

We have a downpour right now, just started about 10mins ago. With thunder and lightening. I ran out to make sure the collection container was empty so I could measure the rain, so we'll see what we end up with. This was again, a situation where there was only a 60% chance of 'showers' today. We're lucky to get a short downpour. I don't expect it to last long. But supposedly we may get more showers in the next 3 days.

And it stopped already. [g] 15m of rain. Then after another 20m we had another minor amount of rain and now the sun is out. I just checked my rain gauge and we got an inch. That was pretty good for that amount of time. I'll take it. And it's steamy out there, hasn't cooled off at all, but tomorrow we're supposed to see some relief from the heat and humidity.

Floral UK - Wow, hard to imagine Hyde Park looking brown like that. I thought the last time I watched a movie in England that the countryside didn’t look as green and lush as it normally does.

You’ve been dealing with drought for years, right?

Are you finding that this is impacting the food supply?

Rouge - we were never able to find a source of local rain records, so that was a key reason we got a rain gauge and started keeping our own records…! DH also notes how much snow we get with every winter storm. Snowmelt is a relevant moisture source, especially for spring growth performance.

No, we haven’t been dealing with drought for years. We get occasional dry spells but this is unprecedented. All time temperature records are being broken. Agriculture is likely to be affected. But it is worse in France and Italy. Over 100 French towns have no water in the pipes at all. It’s being brought in by tanker. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-62486386 

Wow....that's horrible! I'm speechless. Your link wasn't working....

100 Towns in France without water

Drought in Italy

These news are really alarming!

Extreme lack of rain coupled with severe heat waves here in PA. Probably the worst sesason ever in terms of trying to keep things alive. Even when my county had drought declaration and water restrictions, my perennials looked much better than this summer. I'm trimming my forsythia hedge today and have never in the 40+ years that we live here seen it in such bad shape. If forsythia starts to show the effects of dryness and heat, then you know things are really bad.

Forever_a_newbie...."these news are alarming".....you could say that. Hotter / drier weather is likely to continue. Can't imagine what will happen in the western US with Lake Mead drying up as well as other water sources. Unprecedented drought in so many places. Thow in more heat waves, severe storms, wildfires....yep.....fun times ahead for sure.

The last few summers have had decent rain in Maryland. Much better than in past years. Back in the 80s I used to work landscaping during the summer and we had to cut lawns every week no matter what. It was so hot and dry that I frequently cut lawns with no green grass. Maybe a few green weeds here and there. I couldn't tell any difference between what was cut and what wasn't. I would empty my grass catcher and it had more dirt than clippings. I haven't experienced anything like that in decades.

Very cute dish towels, Deanna! I think your friend knows you well. lol

I did hear that they finally got rain in France. Now they have the subway flooding!

First drought, now Downpours

The last forecast of rain for here, disappeared entirely. We had a 70% chance of rain that produced not one drop of rain here. I was back to watering by hand this morning instead of expecting rain.

I WET MY PLANTS .... tooo FUINNY, I'd "almost" want this on a t shirt for the snickers it would receive!

Am in a very bad rain shadow, has hardly rained any bit in the last six weeks, unless thunderstorms are of the strong nature or a broad sweeping low pressure system pushes through the region, scant rain is otherwise received. I can literally watch the rain clouds and thunderstorms being forced to veer off to the south or north of me! I have a good well and of course been watering the veggie garden and what flowers I can, the hose is currently trickle running at the base of some shrubs. I fear for what is coming in the near years, farmers now very regularly struggle to grow decent average crops, it's either being flooded or droughted out often even in the same year! Things have changed soooo much in the last fifteen years that I can't help but believe of very broad spectrum hardships to soon befall mankind!

We got over an inch from Tuesday evening into this morning. It was a nice long gentle rain, so it soaked in instead of running off. Ideal. One weather app says we got over 3”, but I know that is not the case here. My rain guage says otherwise. Maybe somebody in the area got that much, but not me. I’m so very happy to have the rain, finally! I can stop wetting my plants for a bit now.

Been a pretty darn normal summer here

Hello,

coming for inspiration after a nightmare year with no significant rain since March. Both a catastrophe and an opportunity - gardens will need a complete rethink because I am not prepared to put up with pots anymore. Right plant, right place has always been a thing but thinking drought is going to be the new normal (I am also in the most arid part of the UK). Shrubby salvias, ceonothus, sphaeralceas (and mallows in general) and achilleas, I think, while it's farewell to asters, rudbeckias, miscanthus, phlox and other mainstays of the perennial garden.

HU...138 - I just came in the house from taking my first observation about one bed to figure out what did better this year. Mind you I've watered that bed by hand fairly consistently because it has some of my best plants in it. And I've used my rainbarrels on it. But too many times this summer, I've waited until there were a number of plants wilting. Despite that, even the degree of heat has bothered some of the plants, during the hottest 2 weeks we had, when it was like an oven walking out the door at 7am.

Phlox - did not do well. Because we had a pretty fair spring through June, they did look good at that point - I have 'Nora Leigh' which is the variegated form. It bloomed, but smaller blooms, and dead brown leaves all the way up the stems on some of the outer stems now. and all the flower heads are flopped over. It's a mess and has looked worse and worse for the past 6 weeks.

Chrysanthemums - I have two that have done all right because they were at the edge of a part that had a lasagna treatment last year. They did amazing actually in comparison to the previous 3 years. And since they were doing so well, and they were closer to the rain barrel, [g] I think I paid more attention to making sure they didn't dry out. Same varieties did horrible in other places.

One Aster - did seem to tolerate the weather but again, it must have gotten watered enough. Unfortunately, the rabbits did a job on them this year and they are awful looking and 1/4 of the size they were last year.

Hydrangea painculata - Nope. They are in full sun all day and in May with a normal amount of rain, they look good, but, half of June, all of July and August so far, they have not looked very good. Yellowed dropping leaves. Wilting frequently. I can't keep up with keeping them watered. I'm not going to get rid of them, but I'm going to move them into part sun and close to a rain barrel.

I'm surprised, that Hibiscus 'Berry Awesome' with dark leaves and deep mauve flowers had a bad year. Wilting and dropping yellow leaves, smaller flowers, shorter bloom times and a shortened bloom period. I thought they would do great in heat and drought. Nope. Not sure what I am going to do with that.

So what did well?

Sedum 'Autumn Joy' still looks very good. The flower heads arejust developing some color which is early and the size are smaller than usual, but otherwise, they have not wilted, and have not lost their color. The dark leave varieties are bleaching out about halfway up the plant and I don't enjoy that effect. Maybe a part sun location would work.

Gaura, Cosmos, Alyssum, Dianthus....these are the others that have done well. But the cosmos flowers are smaller and burn up quickly but keep coming. The Dianthus had a shorter 1st flush of bloom, but having cut them down to the ground and kept them watered they are now compact fully green cushions, but not blooming yet. Gaura, I've barely noticed a difference and haven't given them any special attention. Alyssum just keeps pushing out new flowers.

That's it for now.

Ah yes, chrysanthemums - the immortales of the garden. I have an old variety with silvery pink petals which is completely cast-iron but unfortunately, doesn't really do much until November...when I am totally fed-up with gardening and hiding out in the sewing/knitting room. Nonetheless, even a swathe of healthy foliage is a plus and they are the easiest plant in the world to propagate.

And gaura - how did I forget (although mine tend to get very tall and stringy. Would benefit from close planting with a more appropriate companion than the nicotianas). Has been a miserable grass year too (apart from the annoying stipas) but I am sincerely hoping a little panicum papillare will prove to be a drought survivor and seed around.

Cosmos were a bit rubbish...although I only grew a smallish deep pink Rubenza instead of the reliable Purity.

Dianthus - hmmm, I grow a tall carthusianorum, alongside catanache, but these are long done and looking a bit grimly.

Early summer is not really difficult but keeping a garden going through to September/October has been more of a challenge. My usual stand-bys - zinnia, dahlia, tithonia have all been a fail although a tremendous alstroemeria 'Etna' is limbering up for another full-on flush (pity it sits under a yellow Graham Thomas rose though - not enamoured of red and yellow in combo).

Cheers for the response, WoodyOak.

Rosaprimula, I’m surprised that the zinnia and tithonia have not done well. I haven’t grown those in a few years.

The Gaura I have has surprised me. I just added it to the garden about 4yrs ago maybe. Previous Gaura had not liked my garden in another location and died out. I was under the impression they were not hardy for me. But, then I read that they were, so I tried them again. This variety has come back 4yrs, the same plants have grown in diameter and are dense. They also reseed a good amount. They bloom a good long while and right now they are stringy with blooms past, so I should have cut them back by now. I forget if I get rebloom or not. They look good with grasses, although grasses I agree have not done well in this weather. The only kind I have are Pennisetum. One looks okay, but my ‘Hamelin’ already started yellowing. Perovskia and Nepeta Walker’s Low look good with the Gaura, which are two more plants that seem to tolerate the heat and drought better than most.

Amsonia ‘Blue Ice’ has looked very good all season. Bloomed normally early summer and has stayed green through the heat. It also divided well in the spring and I’ve increased it to three. It is a compact size and it really doesn't produce the great fall color that the species does.

Penstemon ‘Dark Towers’ has barely been affected. Bloomed well earlier and formed attractive seed heads as usual. I’ve seen some yellow edges on a few leaves on plants growing on a slight incline.

The Dianthus I have is grown from seed and reseeds, called ‘Siberian Blues’. It’s about a foot tall in bloom.

Phlox subulata and Aurina Basket of Gold - have yellowed leaves. They both bloomed normally in late spring. Creeping thymes all are still green and flowered normally. Haven’t noticed any wilting on any of these three.

Cosmos - I haven’t liked mine for a few years and haven’t had time to start over from seed. Some plants produce a ton of bushy foliage and not one bud all summer. Not sure how that happened. I love ‘Purity’ and the bi-colors. They look good with Dill also which has not looked good this year but managed to get to seed for next year.

I forgot to mention roses. They seem to have done well. ‘Julia Child’ looks very green and healthy, but again, I’ve hand watered it pretty consistently. It starts blooming on June 1st about, and did well with a very good flush of bloom through June. After that I deadheaded and had blooms open in more or less a second flush but it was very minimal and flowers were small. I did miss adding a second application of compost and alfalfa meal at the end of the first flush which I normally do though. ‘Savannah’ and ‘Beverly’ look good but again, a second flush was minimal.

That’s just the front garden. I have a whole lot of plants in the rest of the garden that have done very poorly. I will be shocked if I end up with one fern left next year. Even a couple of my epimediums burned up. Most of them in shade have done well.

I was very surprised to see a bed of Vinca under a Maple wilt for the 3rd time last week and it has some brown dead branches showing too. That is usually pretty bullet proof and I've never seen brown stems before.

O, I tend to start the late summer annuals quite late but this year was truly quite deranged. I grow them on my allotment so watering is always a bit tricky because my veggies get priority so the annuals just sat...and sat, doing nothing much, Even the callistephus and tagetes have required watering (which they didn't get so...) Parts of the UK have had some rain but in the east- still nothing apart from a tiny surface teaser. I decided to hold my nerve and use this year as a trial for extreme conditions and it has been educational (which is putting it kindly). Hardy geraniums, for example - normally a bullet-proof addition I have all over the allotment I cut them all back, in hopes of a second bloom, but honestly, I would be grateful for them to simply survive as they are currently crisp and brown.

I have been looking at plants which will go into dormancy such as ranunculous. The tall white aconitifolius is a late spring joy and then vanishes below the soil in a hard woody rootstock. I need more of this sort of thing. I honestly don't mind if the gardens look miserable during July and August but would definitely like a last hurrah before winter. I haven't investigated whteher there is a mediterranean garden subforum but if so, I will be whipping over there as there has to be a bigger choice than my usual lavenders, rosemary and myrtles.

Wondering if gaura might look good with ornamental carrots and the ubiquitous verbena bonariensis. I like an airy, floaty look but again, most of my umbels are done and dusted. Perhaps angelicas.

Sorry - apologies for lengthy rambling - I have bored my friends and family to death so it';s nice to find a place for garden chit-chat.

Um roses_ a bit of a sore point since mine are not well-behaved or mannerly but large thuggish ramblers - blood is shed everytime I walk up and down the plot. Fierce culling planned.

Rosaprimula, My DH does help in the garden and enjoys it, but no, his eyes glaze over for a conversation about the garden. As do all three of my children. So, yes, Gardenweb is essential. Lol

Your garden sounds great. My first love was always vegetable gardening and it wasn’t until shade and critters put a big dent in my vegetable growing, that I focused on other things. This year, I had a slow start, and no time, and then the rabbits made such a mess, followed by drought and heat and I gave up at some point.

I have resorted to adding the tomatoes and the peppers into my front full sun bed because I don’t have enough sun anywhere else. I was going to say, that peppers I would think do very well in the heat and the dryness and are fairly attractive to use in a mixed bed. I didn’t grow them this year, so I can’t say for sure how these extremes would have changed that. I will be adding them again next year. They go in there near the roses and grow in back of alyssum/dianthus/thyme along the edge and some Agastache ‘Honey Bee Blue’ along with them. This year the Agastache ended up smaller with brown edged leaves, earlier bloom and normally they are still being visited by pollinators in the fall but not this year. They seem to already be done.

I have trouble fitting in seed starting. Some years I even end up buying organic veggie starts, because my vegetable garden is small. I like having my own but.... doesn't always work out. I do start beans, cukes, herbs from seed direct sown.

For annuals, I have been relying on reseeding for the most part. I just find I don’t always have the time or energy beyond taking care of all the spring chores to get the garden going. I’d love to do it all, but I just can’t. Every season, I say, next year, I’m going to do this or that, because I miss it, but, hasn’t happened yet.

So, when you say you held your nerve, do you mean you didn’t add any supplemental water? Do you mulch?

Hardy geraniums…cranesbill? I have a few of those too and normally mine look ratty after they stop blooming and I cut them all the way back and they produce a brand new rosette of fresh leaves. This year I didn’t dare cut mine back, I thought they were struggling enough without demanding they produce an entire new set of leaves. They look horrible but I fully expect them to be back next year. Mine are all in part sun.

I can’t grow ranunculus here unless I buy starts. I could, but I’d have to start seed like in January just for annual bedding plants, which I just don’t have the attention to give for that many months. I don’t think they are perennial here. Your example of a perennial in that family is very interesting looking and not what I associate with the look of Ranunculus.

For me, I’m not sure Mediterranean plants will work. I have clay soil and the drainage is not bad, it’s loamy clay, but Salvias and Agastaches that love the great drainage do not love my garden. Rosemary is not hardy here I don’t think, but I grow it in pots and bring it in for the winter.

I have verbena bonariensis in a different location and I’m considering seeding that near the Gaura too. I’ve never grown angelicas.

I love rambler roses in the garden, I don't have any but I do have some climbers that are very exuberant and have lethal thorns on them, so yes, it's a job keeping them in place and out of the way. How did they do in the heat and dryness?

heya Prairie Moon,

O, I only attempt vegetables out of some virtuous thriftiness - I much prefer flowers. I do manage potatoes every year though (lush), and tomatoes in the greenhouse. This year, I still have some squash and leeks and odd salad-y things so not a total fail.

I love reseeding annuals - I am happy to grow more of them. Californian poppies and love-in-the-mist, are everywhere. Cornflowers less so - I have to encourage them a bit more. Hardy annuals which germinate in autumn are such sturdy plants and always so much more robust and floriferous than spring sown ones...although I have awful, sandy soil (drainage is not a problem). I am gradually transitioning to a more natural wildflower garden...a bit like some of the US native gardens except I am not really very bothered by the native provenance of most of my plants...in fact, I have quite a few US natives such as callirhoe, ipomopsis, dalea, penstemons and salvias.

My allotment garden is not actually very nice though, because I used it to test plants for customers - I was a jobbing gardener for quite a while - so it is actually a bit of a mish-mash. The awfulness of this year has definitely given me the boost to make some huge changes. I find it quite hard, grubbing out perfectly good plants, but otoh, I also get quite discouraged by brown stems and curling leaves. Dither and procrastinate...but I swear, this year will be different (the gardener's lament).

I watered my (tiny) garden because I have to look at it everyday and it is mostly in pots, but nope, I did no watering at all at the allotment because I felt a little bit of water was worse than nothing - I need to know that the allotment can get along without continual (any) intervention because I am getting old, have always been a bit lazy and can't be bothered to get on my bike to water flowers. Buying vegetable plugs is perfectly OK in my book. In fact, I am in favour of all and any short-cuts.

Even after a horrible year of drought, there are still plants about...so I am just going to try and choose the toughest. I collected a whole heap of eryngium (not sure what type), achillea (a pink and that tall Coronation Gold), scabious ochraleuca and various centaureas from municipal beds in the vague hope of having a late summer dry prairie type of space. Thanks for reminding me about agastache. I have the mimsy little aurianticas but the taller blues would be a much better choice (assuming they are not massive water hogs). I guess I am still experimenting. I am, for certain, removing a load of classic perennials such as monkshood, rudbeckias, hemerocallis, francoa, and all the asters because they are beyond squinting and look terrible, even from a distance. My usual strategy of leaving my specs at home just isn't working. I would definitely like to do more mulching - I never have enough compost and resort to effective, but ugly mulching with chopped grass, pulled weeds, comfrey leaves...whatever is to hand...but I also love my hoe and can't imagine buying in mulch(because cheapskate).

Hi Rosaprimula, Sorry, I just noticed this post. I choose to get email notifications when someone posts but I don’t always get them all. Oh well, that’s Houzz.

I love gardening but I loved vegetable gardening first. I love roses which I am new to in the past 8 years or so. Really, there’s not a lot about gardening that I don’t love. Maybe cactus. LoL

I love reseeding annuals too. I have California poppies that keep coming back every year. I have the Linen color. My alyssum keeps coming back. I grow Cleome Violet Queen and that reseeds great. I grow Dill in my flower beds and that comes back prolifically.

If I were about 20 years younger with a larger property, I’d love to be gardening for hours every day and have a finger in every pie.

It’s funny to hear you talk about growing US natives. I’ve always been fascinated by English gardens. Have always had plenty of books on them out of the library. Lloyd Christopher’s book ‘Meadows’ reignited my love of meadows. I don’t have the conditions to do that, but they do appeal to me. Beth Chatto’s woodland garden is one of my favorite books. Cannot imagine how amazing it would be to live on a property that looks like hers. Or to have access to so many wonderful gardens to visit there.

What is a jobbing gardener?

I’ve removed lots of plants over the years. Rudbeckias among them. I don’t even have Coneflower any more and I miss it and I was considering adding it back in. I’ve grown Callirhoe but mine disappeared for some reason. Penstemons love my garden. Salvias not so much, drainage not that great.

Mulch does get expensive. We usually buy shredded bark mulch by the bag and that way we can store it and take our time using it as we need it. I do get a lot of leaves in the fall and this year I’m going to try to collect the bagged leaves my neighbors put out to use for more mulch. We will run them over with the mower and use them that way.

We were missed again twice in the last week. Communities around us and about an hour away got 2inches of rain and one had a bonanza of 7.5inches! We had a 1/2 inch total from both days of rain. *sigh* I am resigned to, whatever it is, it is. Nothing I can do about it any way.

We were missed by rain a lot in the past week but did luckily get three rainfalls that added up to 1 1/3”, which is all the rain we got this month so far :-( But it is surprising how well some things are doing out there! The full-sun front garden is blooming well with several White Moth hydrangeas plus a couple of other hydrangea varieties and loads of hardy hibiscuses - the early, paler pink ones are starting to fade now but the later-blooming red ones are now peaking. Fireball are my favorite red ones. The heptacodium tree is starting to bud now. The soil here is pretty heavy clay that is much better now than it was when we started the garden in 2000. ’No bare ground’ is one of my garden philosophies and that plus leaving most of the dead foliage on the ground over winter to ’compost in place’ has helped a lot I think in improving the soil and managing moisture - other than things in pots, we rarely water. Mulch is used on paths but not on garden beds.

This is indeed a good garden chat place :-) DH is an essential helper in the garden but his eyes do glaze over at times and details like botanical names are of little interest. Mind you, I’m worse when it comes to his birding hobby :-) https://www.flickr.com/photos/26679916@N03/albums

But, together I think we’ve produced a good garden that has coped well with these adverse conditions! But I do desperately need cooler temperatures and lower humidity so conditions are more condusive to getting out there to remove all those weeds that don’t seem to be a bit slowed down by heat and dry conditions!

Wrote long post and accidentally deleted it...sigh. Jobbing gardener ; someone who does general regular maintenance for particular gardens. I used to do design and build but am too decrepit to haul paving slabs or mix cement anymore...but I continue to maintain a couple of large-ish gardens on a weekly basis. I grow a lot of plants for my (remaining) customers.

Next year, I am thinking of simply having a little plant stall by my house. I am pretty certain I can grow (and sell) plants, especially since my eldest is also a gardener, as is my D-i-L. Between us, we can cover succulents, orchids, vegetables, shrubs, annuals and perennials. I have certainly gone out of my way to seek out unusual plants from roadside stalls so I think the word will get around quite quickly. I have a lot of stock plants on my allotments, and have been starting with salvias, scented leaf geraniums, semi-ripe cuttings and roses on their own roots (which will fill a niche here in the UK). I love growing my own plants - every aspect of propagation is fascinating, from collecting my own seeds to planting out in people's gardens.

Ah yes, meadows. I should do a post about this as I have been growing a meadow garden for the last 5 years or so. It has been a steep learning curve with quite a few misadventures along the way.

My area, SW England, has just declared an official drought. We're the 11th region that this has happened to.

Our August short passing storms are transitioning to the all day(s) rains of fall. It's been raining since 4pm yesterday and is supposed to quit at 4pm today. We will get a few days to a week break until it rains again. No more having to water the planters/hanging baskets at all. It's 🌂 time again.

I am now collecting grey water in buckets in the shower and kitchen sink.

I'm out west. We're in severe drought territory. It's dry. Our snow pack has not been good lately, which has led to water restrictions.

I know some of you will think I'm out west so what did I expect? Well, when I moved here 25 years ago it was wetter than southern California where I grew up. We had snow in winter and rain in spring and fall, but it's happening less and less.

Having a shady property I fell in love with Hostas and enjoy their companions like astilbes and ferns. Now I'm watching trees in trouble, shrubs drying, and perennials dying. It's very depressing.

I think I'm going through the stages of grief when it comes to my garden so have lost enthusiasm for a hobby that used to bring me joy. I want to get to acceptance and move on and try to love the plants that will survive. But I'm not there yet. It's hard seeing plants I've tended to and look forward to each year struggling and dying.

Prolonged, severe drought is no joke!

La nina weather pattern has been prevalent over the last 20 or so years. La nina is what? It is unusually cold tropical Pacific ocean water. The cold water leads to less and less evapotranspiration which leads to less precipitation in the western US which leads to warmer temps and drought. When weather is wet temps are cool. SO, paradoxically our hot dry weather is caused by cold ocean water. Sure wish that global warming would hurry and heat up the oceans so we could be done with the drought

I'm not so sure it's as simple as 'heating up the oceans' to solve the drought problem. And since all the ice is melting on the poles, that doesn't bode well for our weather either. I'll be shocked if a solution for our weather woes will present itself from any direction. Seems to me that all the reasons that the climate has been damaged are still happening just as badly as they ever did.

We had rain last night briefly - I checked this morning - 1/4 of an inch. We've had 1 and 1/4 inches of rain since the end of June. Never been that bad.

The fact is the water woes in the western US are caused by cold Pacific ocean water - which is the exact opposite of what was predicted to happen to the Pacific ocean. Heck, it was predicted that there would be no Arctic sea ice in the summer by now and it was predicted that the Greenland ice sheet would have collapsed by now - and lo and behold that stubborn ice still persists and in some cases increasing like the Jacobshaven glacier, and overall the ice is well within the overall 20th century averages, as far as records tell. I am extremely skeptical of the anthropogenic global warming hypothesis.

All the ice is not melting at the poles. There's some melting near the coasts. Not much in the interior. And it will takes thousands of years for all of it to melt at current rates. Likewise Greenland has melting near the coasts and some glaciers are moving towards the ocean, but much of the interior ice is stuck between mountain ranges, so it won't ever spill into the ocean. It will take thousands of years for all the ice in Greenland to melt.

I think the average surface temperature of the earth is slowly increasing and man made greenhouse gasses are likely the biggest reason why, but the predictions of doom are greatly exaggerated. Every time there's bad weather, it's reflexively blamed on rising CO2 levels. We've made it through August with no named Atlantic storms. First time since 1961. Tornadoes have been in a long term downtrend. If you only focus on one set of data and ignore everything else, you draw incorrect conclusions.

Clearly, my statement 'All' the ice at the poles is meltng was very inaccurate. Glad to hear it's not as bad as I thought. The fact that man acts without consideration for the planet has brought us to this point. I'm skeptical of what solutions can be found. Based on plans I keep reading about to 'solve' climate change, I'm not persuaded that proposed solutions will be helpful. But without anything changing, I don't see how anything improves, but sometimes people who are in charge, think they know what to do and it turns out they really don't.

Rosaprimula - That sounds like you’ve had a career doing something you love and still doing it. Have you had any plans to suggest changes to the landscape of your clients, that would address drought?

Your plant stand sounds great! It must be great to have a D-i-L that is interested in the same thing you are. I also enjoy propagating when I ever find time to do it, and I did winter sowing for 3 years, very satisfying.

I would be interested in a new thread about your efforts creating a meadow.

we have actually had some rain recently and (gasp) cooler temperatures! Amazing! Also some mist and fog to give the plants a break from the sun. i realized this morning I had actually forgotten what my lambs ear looks like when it is perked up instead of drooping. What a sweet sight!

Deanna,nice to hear some folks start having rains. good relif. your lamb ear looks happy

Deanna, that is a very nice large Lamb's Ear and it looks good! Great that you are getting some rain finally! Let's hope we all get enough precipitation over the winter, that next spring they all come back good as new.

I finally got around to taking some photos. I have never seen my garden in this kind of condition. It was just not possible for me to water and make a difference for most of the plants.

This is what this Blueberry Bush looked like in June.

All the berries shrived on it and then....this is what it looks like now...

This is what the bed of Vinca under the Maple looked like in the spring....

And today it is all shriveled up....

This was 'Nora Leigh' Phlox in the spring before it set blooms....

And this is what it looks like today...

This spring, was the best this 'Ghost' fern looked in a few years because we had an unusual amount of rain last year....

And today....and really at least this fern is still living, I have quite a few that look like they are dead all together. I really tried to keep going back and watering this one because I like it so much, for all the good it did.

Clematis....

Even Asclepias....

And we just got 1/4 of an inch last night.

PM2, I posted a similar post on the NE forum about a week ago - on the Show Us Your Landscape thread. It's awful to see our gardens like this, and like this so very quickly. In June, things were looking great. Now, things are dead, dying or crispy and brown.

I won't post all the before and after pictures like I did on that thread, but here are a few of the worst (and I realize they may be hard to make out, but the general brown-ness and crispiness should get the point across!) And this is with watering (albeit frugally) every other day!

Hydrangea Bombshell

Hydrangea White Dome

Spirea Goldmound

Wegeila

Hostas (also, in the background between the rocks on the left and the tree trunk on the right, you can see a Nikko Blue hydrangea, first full and in bloom, and second, brown and droopy)

Dee

Dee, I went back and looked at your photos on the other thread, yup, your garden looks a lot like mine and your report on the weather forecasts that keep forecasting rain and then not a drop is the same story here.

Your Weigela, looks like toast. I'd be surprised if that comes back next year. Terrible! I'm surprised that Hostas that are shade plants have actually been fairly stable. I expect mine will all return next year, provided the precipitation eventually becomes more normal. I don't know about the mophead Hydrangeas.

I did take more photos - a few of what has done well. For some inexplicable reason, I have one Hydrangea that has no damage to it at all and barely wilted. It's a NOID Hydrangea that I picked up at a local sale as a tiny start. Not even a yellow leaf.

Here's another mophead Hydrangea under a Japanese Maple wilting again 2 days after watering. But notice the epimedium next to it, doing really well.

And here are two Hostas - The first is one that I just added last year and between the rabbits and the drought, it's a mess. The second one is June that has been there for over a decade and not even a yellow edge to a leaf. But June has thicker, waxy leaves. June didn't really bloom this year though.

This has been a really tough year in the garden. I am careful about watering because I have a well. I had my well drilled deeper about 10 years ago, but it’s not a guarantee that it won’t go dry. I have a neighbor who had their well deepened, but eventually they had to drill a new well. Watching my garden suffer has affected my mood. Some days i’m out in the garden trying to keep things alive, but other days i don’t have the energy. It will be interesting next spring to see what survived.

I have been moaning on about the state of my allotment for years...but every year, it gets more and more overgrown and out of control so I generally just tinker around the edges. This year has been so extreme that vague resolutions and my eternal game of hand-wringo are really not going to be enough to allow me to prevaricate any longer. As yet, I don't really have much of a strategy (apart from burn it all down)...but I have just ordered a large amount of cover crop seeds (mostly legumes, fenugreek and grazing rye) so I am going to haul out any remaining vegetable crops, spray off the bloody bindweed (which invades on 3 sides of my plots every year) and put down a 'green manure' to give me some breathing space and hopefully, build up the depleted soil. I can leave this in place for a whole 12 months, so I will miss out a season of flowers and vegetables...but I can sequester a couple of tiny areas and experiment with plant raising and stuff I have planned to do for years (such as making a bunch of hypertufa troughs) but never got around to. And get rid of a bunch of all the water-demanding plants. And thugs such as St.John's wort, saponaria and that whopping euphorbia characias and acanthus.

I am going to do a small bulb order though, just to perk up the meadow area with more anemones, leucojum and camassia. And a whole heap of cheap tulips. I buy wholesale tulips at around $10 per 100 so I have no qualms about chucking them away at the end of the flowering season...or picking great bunches for my kitchen.

I am almost grateful for this awful year as the temptation to kick the can further down the road is something this idle gardener finds only too feasible. Decision is out of my hands.

Rosaprimula, It has not been easy to keep a garden completely workable and on track as I get older and I suspect that is true for most people. If you have something like bindweed, St John’s Wort and Saponaria, oh boy, that is a real impediment. I never had St John’s Wort but I did have Saponaria, which I quickly got rid of.

I had a weed in my vegetable patch about a decade ago and it caused me to abandon vegetable gardening for 2 years. Since I grow organically, I needed to come up with a solution I was happy with. I made the mistake of trying to just use a rototiller and wow, all it did was cut all the very fine roots into millions of new plants. That’s when I just let it go.

I finally got the idea of solarizing the soil and I had a leftover 3ml plastic roll from an outdoor ice rink in the garage and I placed that over the whole area, 25x20ft and left it on there, with no holes in it for water to penetrate and it sat there covered for 12 months, baking in the sun. It worked. I was very happy about it and I’ve never seen that weed back again. If I had to dig the whole thing out by hand, it wouldn’t have been possible because when you pulled it, it just broke the root and left some of it in there. I tried believe me.

So I understand when things get away from you. After that experience, I was very leary of anything I added to the garden that would cause me to have any problem with invasiveness. I still have a few problem plants but nothing like that and they are manageable.

I hope you enjoy the time off, to do other gardening projects!

Finally! RAIN! It poured this morning and I just checked the water gauge and I have 3 inches of rain. The most I've had in one rain event all summer. And we are still supposed to be due to have more today and tomorrow. Normally, the runoff from the downspouts collect in puddles briefly in the back, but it was all absorbed right after it stopped raining. The way my lot lies, I don't get run off from the back of the house. It all absorbs. In the front I get run off, because there is a minor slope to the roadway. I tried to build a berm into my full sun bed there, but it's basically disappeared. Next time I redo that bed I'll have to try to make a higher one.

It's a relief. I'm wondering now, what to do about all the dead branches and stems on some of the perennials and shrubs. If the plants have been so stressed all summer is it better to just leave them alone and clean them up after they go dormant or cut them all back now and let them produce new foliage bf winter?

PM, I am so happy for you! Some of that rain has now traveled to us and it is a nice gentle rain, supposed to last all day. After the 2020 drought was followed by a wet fall, I looked up our climate and wet falls are normal wet. I am grateful late August-September is holding to tradition! Normally rain on Labor Day is a pain, but not this year! Who knows, maybe I’ll take the powerboat out just to enjoy the rain on the water!

PM, please post a picture of a perfectly perked plant after the rain!

Ordering bulbs...including some teeny (and spendy) Chilean crocus (Tecophilaea) because I am fed up with this year (although, to be fair, my garden is rampageous...just a bit squeezed).

Grief, PM and Dee, some sorry looking plant photos - I have always been a little envious of the apparent green lushness of many Z5 gardens (although I don't fancy the winters).

I had a nice little display of santolina 'Lemon Fizz and some agastache aurianticus, on the allotment though, so not all gloom and doom. Plus, a sphaeralcea 'Childerley' has grown into a 4ft high and wide beast in one season and the salvias are astonishing.

Will try to get the hang of transferring pics from my camera to my PC.

Deanna, that's what I think is great about living by the water, the seasons, the weather, it always looks different from one day to the next. Boating sounds like a lot of fun. I hope we get a LOT of rain this Fall to make up for the summer.

Rosaprimula - So the salvias like the heat and tolerate the dry apparently. Guess that shouldn't surprise. Would love to see photos of your garden.

Well, I checked the drought monitor data and nearly all of New England is now at normal rain levels. It has been a wonderfully wet fall and it feels good knowing we go into winter with wet soil and plants recovering. I got 1.5” this week alone!

Dry continues here - 26.5mm so far this month (a tiny bit over an inch…); the October total last year was 176mm…. I’m amazed that fewer things are showing stress damage than I thought there would be- but I sure hope we get a wetter winter!

I've been getting a good amount of rain. This last rain event only brought 1 inch but I've had rain every 7-10 days and 1-3 inches at a time. So yes, the soil is moist right now. My lawn is coming back! I'd never seen it look so awful, and I had pretty good size bare spots. But it's green and filling in. Not as good as it looked last spring before the dry weather, but more recovery than I was expecting. And I think I might have lowered the amount of weeds in the lawn during the drought.

I am not relying on getting enough rain though. I am focused on trying to put a system in place that will give me a much larger amount of rain collection and then a system to water the garden with the rain for a quick turn around to refill them. Still in the planning stage but if I can get the time when I need it, I think I'll be able to be in a better position the next time we have a dry summer.

I'm also building a Berm along the peak of my front bed with lasagna layers, for a two fold affect of keeping more rainwater where it falls in the bed without runoff into the street, and improving the soil.

That's what is news here. Woody I hope you get more rain soon and glad some of you are also getting more rain.

We've had a dry autumn. In the fall, we mainly get rain from the remnants of tropical systems. But this year there was one storm. Ian. It was a bad one for Florida, but the only one. Usually in November we start getting rain from fronts again.