Summer is in full swing, and it’s been anything but predictable in the garden. With wild changes in weather, persistent pests and a to-do list that never quits, I know I’m not the only one combating garden overwhelm this season. In this week’s podcast, I’m sharing what’s been happening in my own garden — from seedling successes and native plant rescues to deer drama, disease challenges, and a few game-changing tools and strategies that are helping me stay on track. Whether you’re thriving, surviving, or somewhere in between, consider this your midsummer gardening pep talk.
And while the challenges are real, there’s still so much to celebrate and learn from this time of year. I’ll walk you through how I’m managing the heat, keeping diseases in check, and staying focused without burning out — plus some exciting updates, like my plans for upgrading my garden infrastructure.
With summer in full swing I have a lot on my plate and even more that I am looking forward to.
Before proceeding with my summer check-in, I want to take a moment to let you know I am offering my Fall Gardening Masterclass on Wednesday, July 30th at noon Eastern. I’ll walk you through how I plan my own fall garden — what to plant, when to plant it and the simple steps that really move the needle. It’s $20 to join, and that includes a downloadable workbook and a full hour of teaching plus a live Q&A after that. Can’t make it live? The replay will be available for 30 days.
Annual Seed Starting and Seed Selling
Early in the year, I am always busy starting seeds for my seedling sale that I do with my daughter, Amy. We just had our eighth annual sale, and it was our best year ever. We truly sold out of everything that we grew: 2,000 tomato seedlings, about 1,000 peppers and some herbs too. When people come by looking for a plant we have already sold out of, invariably, I will go into my personal stash of seedlings and sell them what they are looking for.
It’s a lot of work, no denying that. But we enjoy it, and it’s a great activity to do together. April is a really fun month for us because on Saturdays we’re out there meeting with our customers and our friends as well as some students and fans of the show. And it’s just a unique opportunity to get together face to face with people, which is such a rarity these days. Between all the online content that we create, to actually stand there face to face with somebody is pretty cool.
Next year, we’re going to add native plants, another passion of mine, to the seedling sale.
I start thousands of seeds for both my annual seed sale with my daughter Amy and for my personal use.
Growing My Native Plant Inventory
Because I am so busy in early April selling plants for everyone else’s gardens, I don’t start planting out my own garden until two or three weeks later than I should, but that’s okay.
Once my vegetable garden is planted, I get busy with native plant seedlings. In my native plant beds, I combine the seedlings that I start myself from seeds with native plants that I’ve rescued with the Georgia Native Plant Society. The nonprofit group organizes plant rescues throughout the state. Where the land is ultimately going to be developed, they’re sanctioned by the property owners to remove plants that are destined to be destroyed. Before that happens, we are able to dig them up and find new homes for them.
We all know how important it is to continue to add back native plants in light of climate change and habitat loss and pesticide use. We really need to do our part. So that’s a big part of my life, and I’m only going to get more involved.
There are a lot of native seedlings that I’d like to have in my landscape that I’m not able to find at rescue sites. That’s where my friends at Pinelands Direct. Pinelands Direct is a native plant nursery in New Jersey, and 95% of what they sell is started from seed collected locally. A lot of what they grow is native to my area in Georgia as well. I have all of these seedlings shipped to me that I can also add into my landscape, or maybe I’ll pot some up and add them to the plant sale next year.
Shout out to Tom Knezick, who runs Pinelands Direct, and his buddy Fran Chismar of Pinelands Nursery, and thanks for the work that they do to make these native plant seedlings available. They have a podcast called “Native Plants, Healthy Planet,” and it’s a hoot.
Participating in native plant rescues saves ecologically valuable plants from development and also helps me grow my native plant collection.
Propagation for Free Plants
Since early May I’ve been propagating a lot of plants. As we get into the warmer months and new growth starts to come on, that’s a time when you can begin to take cuttings from your property or from a friend’s place or neighbor’s place — with permission of course. It’s a great way to build up your plant inventory for free, and it’s a lot of fun too.
There are different times throughout the year that you can take cuttings. Mid-July is an ideal time to take semi-hardwood cuttings, when there is new growth coming from the old wood. Hydrangeas are a great example of an easy plant to take cuttings from.
Propagating plants from cuttings is an economical way to get more plants.
(photo: Amy Prentice)
A Big Year for Garden Overwhelm
I have been hearing from listeners around the country and beyond that this is a big year for garden overwhelm and that, weatherwise, this has been the weirdest year. Extreme heat, extreme rain, extreme pests, extreme diseases, poor production, It’s been that way for me too.
I’ve done a whole podcast episode on gardening overwhelm, and it’s been a popular episode because the feeling of wanting to “throw in the trowel” afflicts many gardeners in challenging times.
As much as we love gardening — and I don’t know anybody who loves it more than me — all the forces outside of our control combined with all that we have to do during the peak growing season can begin to feel overwhelming. The straw that breaks the camel’s back can be pest, diseases, the heat or the weeds or all of the above, beating us down.
But the way that I have managed to deal with garden overwhelm is to compartmentalize. I make a plan of what I want to get done — and then I only do those things.
Go out with a plan and say, I’m going to do this today, and I’m not going to look over there. I’m going to work for this amount of time, and I’m going to call it a day.
That doesn’t mean you can’t continue to go on. But you can give yourself permission to say, this is the area I want to conquer today, or this is the project I want to do, and let that be enough. It helps you find a little peace and feel accomplished because at the end point, you’ve done something and you can check it off. You’ve made progress.”
Ultimate Gardening Sheath
When you need to stop what you’re doing to go retrieve a tool or a pen, it breaks your momentum. It’s frustrating, and that adds to the garden overwhelm.
One thing that has helped me save time is the Ultimate Gardening Sheath, the first physical product I have made for the garden. I co-designed and created the Ultimate Gardening Sheath because I needed this myself, and it didn’t exist. It has really made a difference.
The Ultimate Gardening Sheath is handcrafted in North Carolina by Wheeler Munroe Leather Company using high-quality, oil-tanned leather and solid brass hardware. You can wear it on your hips, clipped to your pants or belt, or run your belt right through it.
Why this really makes my gardening life easier is because every time I go out in the garden there are three tools I always use, and this sheath was created to hold all three of those things at one time: My soil knife, my microsnips and my bypass pruners. It also includes a carabiner to attach supplies or another tool to, and pouches for a marking pen and plant tags.
The Ultimate Gardening Sheath keeps my most-used tools accessible, right on my hip.
Control Mosquitoes
A lot of us have been dealing with mosquitoes at an abnormal intensity this year. Historically, I have not been attractive to mosquitoes. But this year has been different — they’re coming after me too.
I did a podcast episode a few weeks ago with Dr. Doug Tallamy on his latest book, “How Can I Help?” And one of the things he talked about was mosquito control. And he offered a suggestion on making a mosquito bucket trap using a five-gallon bucket. I made a video, “How to Rid Your Yard of Mosquitoes without Harming Pollinators,” showing how to make one in a few simple steps.
Add a handful of straw, hay, grass clippings or leaves to a five-gallon bucket. Fill the bucket up with water about two thirds full, put a rescue stick in there in case a critter inadvertently gets in there and needs to get out. Put a Bt dunk in there, put a hardware cloth or screen over the top for protection.
The water-hay mixture, when it rots down, will draw the female mosquitoes that are in your area to that bucket, where they will lay their eggs. Bt (Bacillus thuringiensis) is a bacteria that will kill the mosquito larvae that hatch from those eggs.
Put the bucket in a quiet, shady spot in your yard. One bucket in a typical suburban backyard is enough to draw in all the mosquitoes that are there already to that spot. Remove any competition by emptying out any other standing water that you have.
A mosquito bucket works really, really well. I’ve been using it now all summer, and I’ve had great results with it. Since I put the bucket in place, I haven’t had the issues with the mosquitoes
A mosquito control bucket is simple to prepare but yields outstanding results.
Lots of Rain Means Lots of Plant Diseases
Rain in moderation is great. But when it’s too much, it contributes to the promotion of disease. It tends to aggravate disease issues. So in a hot, humid area, add rain, and it just blows up on you.
There are a lot of ways that diseases get into your garden and onto your plants — through the air, the soil, insects, people, etc. Don’t beat yourself up for it. It is just a fact of gardening. But once you get those, try to keep up with it the best you can by cutting out that diseased foliage and not adding it to your compost pile. Your compost would have to get very hot for an extended period of time to kill off the pathogen. So just to be safe, I recommend that you dispose of it. Throw it away in the trash away from your garden.
There aren’t any fungicides that consumers can buy to cure diseases. Once they’re there, they’re there, and then all you can do is manage them. I cut them out, hence my microsnips that are on my side.
Just try to keep up with it, and then it’s a race to see what kind of productivity you can get out of that plant before it either succumbs to the disease or it grows through it, which can happen too. Don’t give up on that plant just because it has septoria leaf spot or early blight. If you can cut it out and practice good sanitation habits, you may be able to grow through it, and time will tell.
Lots of rain leads to the prevalence of plant diseases.
Protect Yourself and Your Plants from Heat and Sun
To avoid the heat, work out in the garden early in the morning or after you get home in the late afternoon — and avoid the middle of the day, of course. If you must be out in the middle of the day because that’s when you have the time to garden or because you don’t mind the heat, still take precautions.
Growing up in Miami, Florida, I worshiped the sun as a stupid teenager, but we didn’t know better then. Now I’m paying the price with pre-cancerous spots all over. We have to be careful. I wear long sleeve, sweat-wicking shirts with an SPF of 50. The shirts knock the temperature down at least 10°. Even when it’s very hot, I am comfortable wearing long sleeves, more so than if I were out there in a T-shirt.
A long-sleeve sweat-wicking shirt, a big hat and sunglasses protect me from the sun’s damaging rays and keep me cool.
If your plants are showing signs of stress in the sun, you can give them some relief using shade cloth. Some 50% or 70% shade cloth will allow the plants to stay cool while getting enough light to photosynthesize. Your plants will thank you for it. They’ll do better. They won’t look as sad. They won’t wilt as much. They will continue to perform.
Once the temperature gets to 90° or warmer, the pollen in tomato plants starts to stick and get heavy, or the pollen is killed off. Shade cloth can protect the pollen so the flowers will form fruit.
But don’t wrap the shade cloth around the plant tightly or even semi tightly. For instance, if your plant is growing in a cage, don’t wrap it right around the cage, because you need some air circulation between the shade cloth and the plant.
Suspending the shade clothes over the plants with a few feet of separation really helps, knocking down the temperature about 7° on average, but that can make all the difference in the world.
My seedling nursery is under shade cloth installed over a carport frame.
Excluding Deer
My garden is large, with 16 raised beds. The split rail fence around it is only 4 feet tall, but it successfully keeps deer out. I get asked every day, how is that possible?
I have lots of deer on my property, and they’ve never gone into my garden. People can’t get their heads around why that is. It comes down to the fence’s configuration. The beds are so close to the fence that when the deer look in from the outside, they see no safe place to land. That was my theory when I tried it 13 years ago, and it worked.
I had never had a deer in the garden — until this week. I just got home from vacation. I had gone out to my garden and saw a lot of damage that just couldn’t be from a rabbit. It was higher up like on the stalks of sunflowers and it had torn ends. Rabbits have sharp teeth. Deer don’t have those sharp teeth, so their bites tear plants.
After a dozen years with no deer issues, at least one deer has figured out a way to enter my vegetable garden.
The first day back this week, I was sitting in my office, which looks out onto my garden, and I saw a deer walking by, which is not unusual. But this deer was stopping and looking into my garden a little too long. I’m used to them walking by, but they don’t really linger. This deer looked like it was poised to jump in. I could tell: This deer has been in my garden.
I watched as the deer walked around one of the four garden gates and jumped over it. I now need to add obstacles to discourage the deer. In a new video next week, I’ll show the steps I am taking to ensure deer won’t return to the garden again.
If you have a clever solution that works for you that’s not one of the typical solutions, I’d love to hear about it. Drop a comment here, on YouTube, on Instagram or email me at heyjoe@joegardener.com.
A split-rail fence has protected my vegetable garden from deer for many years. Here is how it looked when it was installed 13 years ago.
Prepare the Fall Vegetable Garden
If you’ve never grown a fall vegetable garden before and you’d like to try it, let me tell you, it is the most forgiving time of the year for having a successful vegetable garden. There are a lot of things that grow in the fall that don’t like the summer, such as lettuce or brassicas: broccoli, Brussels sprouts, cabbage, cauliflower, etc. They taste better with the more cold they are exposed to. When they’re kissed by frost, they get sweeter.
Here in the middle of the summer is the time that we need to start those seeds. And it seems really crazy to be thinking about starting your cool season seedlings in dead of summer. But you need that ramp up time. You need those seeds to germinate and mature to the point that they’re large enough and hardy enough to go into the garden in late summer or early September.
Brassicas such as broccoli and cauliflower are excellent crops for a fall garden. The time to start seeds for a fall garden is now.
Order Seed Garlic ASAP
I never thought to order my garlic cloves well in advance of the time to plant them. I plant them in November, but when I would order them in late October, the varieties that I wanted were sold out.
I’ve fortunately formed the habit of getting my garlic order in early. I’ve already done that for this year, and I got all my favorite varieties.
I just released a new video about what you should know when ordering garlic.
Order garlic now for fall planting. If you wait, the varieties you really want may be sold out.
Upgrading My Plant Nursery, Compost Area and Garden Beds
During my annual August sabbatical, I am going to work on my nursery area on the north side of my greenhouse. Over a carport frame, I installed a shade cloth. Underneath I have an area to work comfortably, where I can put plants that don’t want to be in full sun and seedlings that I am hardening off.
It’s been great, but I need to refine it. I will make a video of my efforts and share it with you. I’m very excited about this. Once I redo that area, I will have so much more room to put in new seedlings, propagation cuttings, seed trays, plant rescues — you name it. I’ll triple the working space
Then in fall, I plan to redo my compost area.
My compost bins are made of untreated pallets. They’re free, and they last on average about five years from the time that you put them together, which only takes a few minutes. I have three bins, and each has three bays. That’s nine bays for compost, and they are all full.
My bins are at the point that they are ready to be replaced, and I am planning an upgrade.
My compost bins are made of untreated pallets, which I find for free. But they only last five years before they need to be replaced.
All that compost will be used for my other big fall project: Replacing my raised garden beds. The beds are 13 years old, made from untreated 6×6 timbers.
Replacing the beds is not something I want to do, but this is something I need to do. I’m going to show you the entire process: the planning, the thought process, the soil choice, the material choice, the layout, etc. I have a lot of decisions to make, but I think it will be fun to include you in on this through documenting the entire process.
Replacing my aging garden beds is not a project that I am looking forward to, but I will make it fun by sharing my decision-making process and my progress.
I hope you enjoyed my summer check-in. If you haven’t listened yet, you can do so now by scrolling to the top of the page and clicking the Play icon in the green bar under the page title.
What big projects are you planning to accomplish in your garden? Share with us in the comments below.
Links & Resources
Some product links in this guide are affiliate links. See full disclosure below.
Episode 065: Tips For Reducing Garden Overwhelm, with Margaret Roach
Episode 122: Fall Vegetable Garden Success: Best Plants and Tips for Cool-Season Growing
Episode 228: Growing Great Garlic, With Alley Swiss of Filaree Farm
joegardener Blog: The Complete Guide to Growing Garlic (Everything You Need to Know)
joegardenerTV YouTube: How to Rid Your Yard of Mosquitoes without Harming Pollinators
joegardenerTV YouTube: Why You Should Order Garlic in Summer (Not Fall)
joegardener Fall Gardening Masterclass | Wednesday, July 30th at noon Eastern | I’ll walk you through how I plan my own fall garden — what to plant, when to plant it and the simple steps that really move the needle. It’s $20 to join, and that includes a downloadable workbook and a full hour of teaching and an additional live Q&A after that. Can’t make it live? The replay will be available for 30 days.
joegardener Online Gardening Academy™: Popular courses on gardening fundamentals; managing pests, diseases & weeds; seed starting and more.
joegardener Online Gardening Academy Organic Vegetable Gardening: My new premium online course. The course is designed to be a comprehensive guide to starting, growing, nurturing and harvesting your favorite vegetables, no matter what you love to eat, no matter where you live, no matter your level of gardening experience.
joegardener Online Gardening Academy Master Seed Starting: Everything you need to know to start your own plants from seed — indoors and out.
joegardener Online Gardening Academy Beginning Gardener Fundamentals: Essential principles to know to create a thriving garden.
joegardener Online Gardening Academy Growing Epic Tomatoes: Learn how to grow epic tomatoes with Joe Lamp’l and Craig LeHoullier.
joegardener Online Gardening Academy Master Pests, Diseases & Weeds: Learn the proactive steps to take to manage pests, diseases and weeds for a more successful garden with a lot less frustration. Just $47 for lifetime access!
joegardener Online Gardening Academy Perfect Soil Recipe Master Class: Learn how to create the perfect soil environment for thriving plants.
Sweat-wicking, SPF 50 long-sleeve shirt — Men’s
Sweat-wicking, SPF 50 long-sleeve shirt — Women’s
Dramm – Our podcast episode sponsor and Brand Partner of joegardener.com
Milorganite® – Our podcast episode sponsor and Brand Partner of joegardener.com
Disclosure: Some product links in this guide are affiliate links, which means we get a commission if you make a purchase. However, none of the prices of these resources have been increased to compensate us, and compensation is not an influencing factor on their inclusion here. The selection of all items featured in this post and podcast was based solely on merit and in no way influenced by any affiliate or financial incentive, or contractual relationship. At the time of this writing, Joe Lamp’l has professional relationships with the following companies who may have products included in this post and podcast: Milorganite, Soil3, Territorial Seed Company, Proven Winners ColorChoice, and Dramm. These companies are either Brand Partners of joegardener.com and/or advertise on our website. However, we receive no additional compensation from the sales or promotion of their product through this guide. The inclusion of any products mentioned within this post is entirely independent and exclusive of any relationship.
