Fall gardens are fun...

The first warm season garden was a bit of a bust in this short bed due to the reasons given below. Everyone that grows in hot weather wanted a much deeper bed. To be sure your zucchini, watermelon and other fast/big growers have enough space in their urban home, provide at least 12" soil of depth. As many of the asphalt garden projects (Detroit and Cleveland as examples) recommended a cardboard bottom, our summer bed retained much more water than expected and most likely kept the roots soggy -- not good! If the roots are soggy, there's no oxygen AND they will rot.

During a hot July, these tomatoes were planted by seed, though they would have been much happier planted at the beginning of the season. They were coming along and producing tomatoes, but slowly.

Then the monsoons came. Because this bed was shallow and lined with cardboard, an inch of rain in one day was almost the death of these plants! Fortunately, the strong sun in New Mexico can cure an over-watering problem pretty well and therefore, these plants recovered though the yellow leaves is a clear indicator of the problem. New growth on the plants finally started to look good, which is where you should always check to see if your solutions are working. Don't look at the old growth - it won't get better so you might as well clip or pinch it off!