July is very hot here in Florida. Our garden is showing signs of the constant heat. The only thing that grows extrememly well in the months of July and August here are weeds! I have been buying a few bags of mulch each week and putting this around all out plants and trees to replace last years mulch and straw. This has helped to conserve some of the moisture in the soil around the plants.
The latest reports on the economy have made me very happy that we've grown so much of our own food this year. The more we grow now...the more we will be use to growing if we are forced to do so. I have figured out that our current garden 25 x 30, requires about an hour and a half of maintenance every other day. So, if one of us were to lose our income, a garden two or three times this size would be very manageable for one person at home during the day. We fortunately would only need to buy items like milk, sugar and flour if this was the case.
I will post some pictures of our edible beds and some potted items we have on the side of the house soon. We need to decide where to plant the two pinneapple guava plants I purchased last fall. We have a water chestnut plant that is doing so well in a pot that I'm tempted to put in a small water garden to get it really going.
We hope to have more updates soon as we plant our second summer garden and begin to plan for our fall/winter garden. Shallots will need to be planted next month and garlic a month or so after that. There is much to do here at the yardstead despite the increasing heat.