Posted on by tonytomeo

Warming Summer Weather

Dog Days!

My great grandfather could remember more summers in Sunnyvale than anyone else. He knew how unique every summer was and continues to be. Some summers are uncomfortably hot from beginning to end. Last summer though, was the coolest in recorded history!

Warm summers are of course best for the fruits and vegetables that like warmth. Peaches, grapes, tomatoes and rhubarb in my great grandfather’s garden always got the best flavor during warm weather. Warm but not too hot weather early in summer made the best ‘Bing’ cherries on my grandmother’s tree in Santa Clara.

Although cool summers are more comfortable for dogs, cats and people, they are not quite as conducive to growing fruits and vegetables. It is still too early to know what this summer will be like, but even though it is now getting warm, the warmth is developing late. The past spring was remarkably mild, with rain lingering later than it typically does.

Consequently, some fruits and vegetables, as well as some flowers and trees, are developing slowly. Peaches may be a bit smaller than they typically are, with slightly milder flavor. Rhubarb should have good flavor because of recent warm weather, but may develop a bit late because it got a late start.

Tomatoes are perhaps expressing the most dissatisfaction with the mild weather. Even tomato plants that were put out in the garden early in spring have grown slowly, and are not nearly as productive as they typically are by the beginning of summer. Some are not yet producing!

Fortunately and unfortunately, the weather has gotten significantly warmer. This may be uncomfortable for us; but is a party for the formerly bored tomato plants. Warmth of course promotes bloom and fruit production, and enhances flavor. If they get what they need, tomato plants that seemed sickly in the past may suddenly grow like weeds.

They should waste no time making up for lost time. Even if mild weather continues into summer like it did last summer, it will still get warmer than it has been. Maturing tomato plants will want more water and fertilizer (if used) as they get larger, and the weather gets warmer.

Posted on by tonytomeo

Warm Season Annuals Start Early

Nasturtium grows best directly from seed.

Cool season annuals that started late last summer should be finishing soon. A few might have potential to continue as perennials. However, about as many are done or decaying. Now, warm season annuals, or summer annuals, should eventually start to replace them. If it seems early, it typically does for such bedding plants before their respective seasons.

Some annuals can not decide if they are cool season annuals or warm season annuals. Stock is actually a cool season annual but becomes more popular now for spring bloom. Wax begonias might have survived through winter to resume growth for another season. Primrose is a cool season annual that rarely gets too warm locally to continue blooming.

These indecisive annuals can actually be an asset to home gardens. Stock, for example, can replace old pansies while it is still too early for petunias. It compensates for cool and warm season annuals with more definite seasons. Petunias will be ready before stock is done. Some garden enthusiasts replace seasonal annuals for each of their four seasons.

Warm season annuals, like all annuals, are contrary to sustainability. Although many can perform as perennials, few actually do. Those that truly are annuals complete their entire life cycles within one year. Their main purpose is to provide floral or perhaps foliar color. Texture and form are also assets. Annuals are popular because they serve this purpose.

The most popular of warm season annuals grow from cell packs. Those that start earliest are already available, including wax begonia and lobelia. Petunia, impatien and annuals that crave more warmth will become available later. Four inch potted annuals are bigger than those in cell packs, but more expensive. They are even more expensive in quantity.

Many more varieties of warm season annuals are available as seed. Countless more are available online than from nurseries. However, seed requires more effort. Most must start early. Although most grow well in flats or cells, some prefer direct sowing. Sunflower and nasturtium are very vulnerable to the distress of transplanting. Seed is the logical option. Many seed are less expensive than six cell pack seedlings.

Posted on by tonytomeo · 4 Comments

Summer Warmth Continues Into Autumn

Dog days of summer are over.

The locally mild climate might be rather boring. Winter weather is not very cold. Summer weather is only sometimes very hot. Then, warmth does not often last for very long. Such climate might seem to be deficient in seasons. Summer seems to be the primary season, with just a few cool weeks of winter. Spring and autumn seem to be only brief transitions.

According to the position of Sirius, the Dog Star, the dog days of summer are done. They are the hottest days of the year for several climates of the Northern Hemisphere. The last was the eleventh of August. The final day of summer is the twenty-second of September. Such dates are less relevant here than elsewhere, though. Warm weather may continue.

Indian summer is more typical here than not. In some other climates, it is unusually warm and dry weather that continues into autumn. In this particular climate, it is not so unusual. Another difference is that it does not occur after earlier frost, as it might elsewhere. Some climates here lack frost anyway. Locally, warm weather is more lingering than fluctuating.

Some vegetation knows how to exploit such weather. Indeterminate tomato varieties can continue to be productive until a first frost. If they started soon after a last frost, they could get sloppy with rampant growth. That should not be a problem if production is the priority. With phasing as late as August, determinate tomato varieties can also produce until frost.

Most popular canna cultivars are hybrids of tropical and montane species. Because they are tropical, they are not accustomed to distinctly cool winter seasons. Because they are montane, they survive mild frost. Therefore, they grow until frost, and then resume growth as soon as they can afterward. Dahlia is similar, but maintains dormancy through winter.

Photoperiod also influences growth. Days gradually shorten through summer regardless of the duration of warmth. Some species are more responsive to this than others. Later in summer, crape myrtle can slowly begin to develop autumn foliar color. It does not require much chill to become strikingly colorful for autumn. It can do so while cannas still bloom and tomato plants still produce fruit.

Posted on by tonytomeo · 4 Comments

Reveille

Angel’s trumpet, Brugmansia X cubensis ‘Charles Grimaldi’

Summer has been slow to arrive. Now, some flowers that have been waiting for a bit of warmth to bloom are ready to make up for lost time.

These angel’s trumpets are fortunately silent. Even prior to full bloom, so much bloom looks silly with such minimal foliage.This picture is a few days old; so they are in full bloom by now. More foliage will develop as the summer progresses.

This particular cultivar is the common ‘Charles Grimaldi’, with splendidly fragrant single yellow flowers. Two other cultivars are blooming nearby. One is somewhat less vigorous, with single white but perhaps less fragrant flowers. The other is more compact than ‘Charles Grimaldi’, with double white and comparably fragrant flowers.

All were grown from cuttings, and have potential to grow like weeds. Six more of the cultivar with double white flowers were added to another landscape nearby. Several of both cultivars with white flowers are developing in the nursery, and will need homes either in the landscapes or neighbors’ gardens by next year. Another cultivar in the nursery may bloom with mildly fragrant single pastel orange flowers in the next few days, but we will not know until it actually does so. We have not seen it bloom yet. It could actually be another copy of ‘Charles Grimaldi’.

Daylilies are beginning to bloom now also. Like angel’s trumpet, they seem to have been waiting a bit longer than they wanted to, so are ready to bloom simultaneously in atypical profusion. I hope that such profusion does not compromise subsequent bloom, since they continue to bloom throughout summer and until frost. Also like angel’s trumpet, daylilies are so easy to grow and propagate that there has been no incentive to acquire more cultivars than the three or so that are already here.

Posted on by tonytomeo · 5 Comments

Out of Tune Trumpet

Brugmansia X cubensis ‘Charles Grimaldi’

Summer was mild. Vegetation that enjoys warmth grew relatively slowly through much of it. Then, toward late summer, and without increased warmth, some vegetation seemed to accelerate growth unexpectedly. Banana and heliconia pups grew like they should have earlier in summer. Angel’s trumpet cuttings began to get somewhat weedy. Some that did not bloom earlier began to bloom now!

Brugmansia X cubensis ‘Charles Grimaldi’ is likely the most popular angel’s trumpet. It is the most vigorous, and may be the most fragrant. One cutting that survived the unusually cool frost last winter grew from its roots to more than six feet tall since then. Now that it is time for it to decelerate growth, it is blooming! Such performance is impressive, but not in tune with the seasons. It can not continue for long, before disruption by increasingly cool autumn weather. Unusually vigorous growth that continues to bloom unusually late could be unusually vulnerable to frost next winter.

This is not the only angel’s trumpet that is out of tune with its seasons. A similarly mature specimen of an unidentified cultivar with single white flowers is about to bloom also. Two older specimens of other unidentified cultivars are growing about as vigorously, although without bloom. One blooms with double white flowers. The other blooms with single pale orange flowers.

About nine copies of each of both cultivars that bloom with white flowers are growing like weeds in #1 cans, with more than a dozen more small cuttings of the cultivar that blooms with double flowers in cells. Only the original matured specimen that blooms with double white flowers actually inhabits a landscape, and is incidentally about to bloom, but is not here with these in the nursery. More will go to landscapes after winter, where their bloom can be enjoyed.

Posted on by tonytomeo · 4 Comments

Early Rain

This could be a sequel to ‘Late Summer’ from yesterday. It happened shortly afterward. It certainly adds another interesting component to this already odd year of weather. Although not impossible, rain at this time of year is rare. Almost all of the rain here occurs between late autumn and early spring.

Weirdly, if rain does occur during summer, it typically does so around the fifteenth of August. Seriously, it is very prompt about that schedule. It typically either begins or ends on that same date.

The first flash of lightning of the storm that started the CZU Fire occurred at 11:59 p.m. on the night of the fifteenth of August of 2020, less than a minute prior to midnight. So, although the storm occurred during the early morning of the sixteenth, it technically began on the night of the fifteenth.

This brief rain shower was minimal, but by local standards, it was surprising. I sort of wanted it to continue long enough to dampen and contain the dust of summer. It might have done so briefly, but could not prevent the dust from becoming dusty again shortly afterward. The aroma of damp asphalt dissipated even before that happened. It was fun while it lasted.

Perhaps this rain shower will be the last of this unusually autumnish weather. Warm and dry summery weather typically resumes immediately after brief rain showers that happen during the middle of August. Technically, for a summer rain shower, it is only half a month late. So far, the forecast does not suggest that pattern, but it has been wrong before, even here. I doubt that there will be any more rain prior to autumn, even if cool autumnish weather resumes until then. But of course, I have been wrong more often than weather forecasts.

Posted on by tonytomeo

Late Summer

Such weather is early this year.

The change of seasons can be boring here. It might seem as if this climate experiences only two seasons. Summer is the primary season, which seems to extend through most of the year, with what seems to be merely a few days of another brief secondary season which is not summer. Perhaps this brief secondary season is autumn, winter and spring, but that is too many letters and big words for such a small season.

That is how those who are familiar with more distinct seasons might perceive seasons of this innately mild climate. Those of us who are familiar with this climate perceive it quite differently. We are aware of the four seasons, regardless of how mundane the transitions between them seem to be. In fact, some might contend that, if autumn seems to be minimal here, it is merely because this climate experiences a fifth season between summer and autumn, which is known as Indian summer.

Indian summer is an extension of summery weather into autumn, and sometimes occurs after summer seems to have begun to succumb to autumn. It does not happen annually, and does not seem to be happening this year, but certainly could. It is sneaky that way.

For now though, autumn seems to be sneaking into the last two weeks of summer, much like Indian summer sometimes sneaks into autumn. Nights have been interestingly cool. Low clouds have been lingering a bit longer after sunrise than they typically do.

However, vegetation that enjoys warmth does not seem to be decelerating for cooler weather. Perhaps such vegetation knows more than the rest of us do about what to expect. Perhaps it is merely more responsive to photoperiod than weather. Regardless, I get the impression that this is how late summer typically is within other climates.

Posted on by tonytomeo · 13 Comments

Muskogee?

This is not a color I had expected.

What cultivar of crape myrtle is this?! I realize that this picture is blurred, which is why it was not included within my ‘Six on Saturday’ post this morning, but it is the floral color that is important. Is it purplish pink, or just bright pink? What cultivar does it look like?

I expected this crape myrtle to be one of the old reliable cultivars because it was a gift from the Arbor Day Foundation. The primary old reliable cultivar that blooms with similar floral color is ‘Muskogee’. Yet, even with my limited ability to discern color quality, this floral color seems to be a bit too rich. I sort of expect a milder and scarcely purplish pink from ‘Muskogee’. I suppose that the Arbor Day Foundation can also grow modern cultivars like the rest of us.

Regardless of its identity, it is certainly pretty. The foliar color during autumn is comparable to that of old reliable cultivars. Because neighbors like it, I grew a few copies for them. We would like to incorporate more crape myrtles into the landscapes at work. The abundance of spring color from other species there mostly finishes prior to the summer bloom of crape myrtle. Summer is the busiest season, so justifies flashy color.

Embarrassingly though, I am still none too keen on crape myrtle. If I did not typically spell ‘crape’ as ‘crepe’, I would prefer to spell it without the ‘e’ at the end. I was impressed with it when I first started to notice it through the 1980s, but then realized that it was becoming too common through the 1990s. That was long after Brent told me that it had become too common throughout the Los Angeles region significantly earlier. Decades later, it is still too much of a good thing.

Posted on by tonytomeo · 24 Comments

Hurricane Hillary

Rain is expected to start about six or seven in the morning in Brent’s neighborhood.

California is so big that, from here, it extends about four hundred miles to the north and four hundred and fifty miles to the south. That is where San Diego County is, in the southwestern corner of California. It is so far away that the weather there can be very different from here, as it is now that Hurricane Hillary is coming up from the coast of Baja California. While a tropical storm warning is in effect there, typical summer weather is expected here.

Typical summer weather here is dry. Not much rain happens after early spring. Not much happens prior to late autumn. Every few years, a single odd and brief thunderstorm goes through in the middle of summer, leaving no evidence of its downpours two days later. If it were to happen this year, it should happen about now, like it is in Southern California.

Forecasts for the weather in Southern California are quite unpleasant. A friend in Palm Springs was filling sandbags today. Floods and mudslides are expected through a huge area. This is the first tropical storm in California since 1939, and the first ever tropical storm warning. Yet, we will miss it completely here.

I try to remind myself that the historically torrential rain of last winter was no fun. Flooding was a mess, and caused significant damage even in this neighborhood. Nonetheless, even native Californians can start to miss rain late in summer.

Brent will likely telephone at about seven in the morning. It might be raining by that time. It should finish by noon on Monday. Realistically, it will not rain for long. The problem is that rain will be torrential, especially at high elevations out in the deserts, which do not absorb much water. It will be interesting to see what transpires.

Posted on by tonytomeo · 20 Comments

Six on Saturday: Those Lazy-Hazy-Crazy Days of Summer

Summer is a few days more than half finished. Weather remains noncompliant. Again, I should not get redundant by describing how last spring lingered, with only a few days of summery warm weather. Instead, I can now describe how the weather is beginning to be more like that of autumn. There is still time for some warm weather through September and perhaps even into October here. For now, we can simply appreciate the comfortably mild weather. During a typically warm summer, this is about when we begin to miss the rain. It might finish during March, and might not resume until November. The dew this morning looked almost like raindrops, but even a native Californian can distinguish dew from real rain.

1. Mornings start out atypically cool and damp. It is not exactly hazy. Nor is it uniformly foggy. It almost looks cloudy. It has been doing this for much of this oddly mild summer.

2. Friday morning was so damp that the dew resembled rain. It left spots on windshields of the work pickups, although such spots were not circular as if caused by real raindrops.

3. Banana trees and other species that appreciate warmth are growing unusually slowly. This happens to be the rare Musa ingens, which is the biggest banana tree in the World.

4. ‘Ponderosa’ lemon is slightly chlorotic, likely because of the lack of summer warmth. I should remove the fruit to redirect resources. One lemon can grow to weigh two pounds.

5. Giant reed is one of the most aggressively invasive exotic species within riparian zones of California. It does not seem so aggressive in cultivation here while the weather is cool.

6. ‘Proud Land’ rose bloomed nicely and nearly on schedule last spring, and continues to bloom, although somewhat reluctantly. I installed this now old specimen in about 1984.

This is the link for Six on Saturday, for anyone else who would like to participate: https://thepropagatorblog.wordpress.com/2017/09/18/six-on-saturday-a-participant-guide/