Many favorite herbs are perennial plants. I don't recommend growing these perennials in beds with annual vegetables, because the herbs need to stay in place for several seasons. Among the most common woody perennial herbs are rosemary, marjoram, oregano, sage and thyme. Plant them in a sunny location and don't over water. Trim them regularly to keep them shapely and you can enjoy them for several years. Rosemary plants can become quite large, so give them space or prune them vigorously from time to time.
Some herbs are invasive if not contained. Grow peppermint, spearmint, lemon balm and other mints in containers or in a part of your yard where they won't overtake other plants. These herbs thrive in partial shade in Napa Valley, and they like more water than the woody herbs. I have a happy patch of peppermint growing in a bed surrounded by a stone patio. It serves as a ground cover under a small citrus tree, and the water needs of both seem compatible.
One of my favorite garden herbs is French tarragon, but I learned the hard way that I shouldn't grow it in the vegetable patch. This plant dies back to its roots during cold weather. If grown in a spot that is undisturbed, it re-sprouts in the spring. I had a vigorous tarragon plant in the middle of a vegetable bed one summer. The next spring, before the tarragon sprouted, I cleared the bed of weeds and roots, accidentally including the dormant tarragon. My new tarragon planting is in a mostly ornamental bed close to the house. In the fall, I will mark its spot with a stake so that I don't uproot the plant by mistake.
In contrast, annual and biennial herbs make good neighbors for summer vegetables. Let's look at four of the common ones.
Basil is the queen of herbs in my summer garden. Traditional Italian types are essential for pesto, but there are dozens of other basils to try with different leaf color, leaf size and aroma. I like the purple varieties for their color, and I am also fond of lemon basil for a different but delicious pesto. Basils are frost sensitive, so plant them in late spring after the frost season ends. You can start basil easily from seed, or buy plants from the nursery. Remove flower spikes when they form, and the plants will produce leaves until cold weather kills them. If you have all the basil you need for cooking, you can let some of the plants bloom. The purple varieties, in particular, have pretty flowers.
Parsley is my old reliable. A biennial plant, it will go to seed during the winter, or sometimes at the end of summer. So I set out plants a couple of times during the year to have a fresh supply. There are two main types, curly-leafand flat-leaf, and both grow readily in ordinary garden soil.
You can start parsley from seed, but the seeds take a couple of weeks to sprout. If you don't have time for seed starting, buy a nursery six-pack, which produces plenty of parsley for family use. In my country garden, gophers are a problem, and they seem to like parsley roots. I plant parsley all around the vegetable patch, hoping that if gophers get one spot, they will miss the others and I will not lose my entire parsley crop.
Cilantro is a fast-growing herb essential to Mexican cuisine. It is easy to grow, but it does present one main problem. It grows so quickly from seed to bloom that you must plant it frequently to have a steady supply for the kitchen. It prefers cool weather, so in summer it will do better in a shady spot. Plants don't need much room, so try growing cilantro in the shade of larger summer plants such as tomatoes or pole beans. You can buy seedlings, but if you are a serious cilantro user, buy seeds and sow a few every couple of weeks.
Dill is another annual herb that merits more than one planting, particularly if you want to have dill for pickling in late summer. In my garden, I let some plants go to seed each summer. In April, the seeds will sprout and provide the first fresh leaves of the season. By June, this early dill will be sending up flower heads, so I plant a second crop toward the end of May. This system extends the harvest season and assures that I will have partially ripe heads for pickling when my cucumbers mature.
In summary, annual and biennial herbs can share the beds with vegetables, while perennial herbs need their own space. If you have no garden at all, consider containers. Many herbs do well in pots. Whether you choose to grow one or two or a few types, your summer meals will be much more flavorful.
Workshops: Napa County Master Gardeners will host a workshop on “Good Garden Resources in Print & Tech” on Saturday, July 11, from 9:30 a.m. to 11:30 a.m., at the University of California Cooperative Extension office, 1710 Soscol Avenue, Napa. Who do you trust for dependable gardening information? Where do you look for answers to your horticulture questions? Participants are invited to bring tablets or laptops. Master Gardeners will help you evaluate sources of gardening information, both online and in print.Online registration (credit card only);
Mail-in registration (cash or check only).
Napa County Master Gardener will also host a workshop on “Dealing with Drought and Drought-Tolerant Plants” on Saturday, July 11, from 10 a.m. to noon, at Mid-City Nursery, 3635 Broadway, American Canyon. Learn what to do now to help your garden survive on very little water. We will discuss what kinds of plants do best with minimal water. Learn about easy-care, long-flowering, colorful plants for your garden and ones that will attract pollinators. We will also discuss fire-wise plants and gardens. Online registration; Mail-in registration.
Master Gardeners are volunteers who help the University of California reach the gardening public with home gardening information. Napa County Master Gardeners ( http://ucanr.org/ucmgnapa/) are available to answer gardening questions in person or by phone, Monday, Wednesday and Friday, 9 a.m. to Noon, at the U. C. Cooperative Extension office, 1710 Soscol Avenue, Suite 4, Napa, 707-253-4143, or from outside City of Napa toll-free at 877-279-3065. Or e-mail your garden questions by following the guidelines on our web site. Click on Napa, then on Have Garden Questions? Find us on Facebook under UC Master Gardeners of Napa County.
- Author: Susanne von Rosenberg
How much water a plant needs is driven by day length,temperature and wind. Plants lose water as long as they are photosynthesizing—in other words, as long as it is light out. The hotter and windier it is, the more water a plant needs.
Usually plants need the most water in early summer, at the end of June and beginning of July. A few weeks can make a big difference. Six weeks before that peak and six weeks afterward, your garden needs only about two-thirds as much water. By the end of September, plants need only about one-third the water that they did at the peak.
How much water your plants need also depends on how you use it. It can be scary to cut back when you've been successful with your watering regimen.To help you, here are some tips for conserving water in the vegetable garden and orchard:
Start with improving your soil because healthy soil holds more water. Amend with compost or other organic matter. Soil rich in organic material retains five times as much water as depleted soil does. So the healthy soil on my one-acre property holds an extra 100,000 gallons of water. Make sure your soil is thoroughly moist before you plant.
Mulch your garden. A generous layer of mulch will keep soil moisture from evaporating. As a bonus, organic mulches enhance soil fertility and water-holding capacity in future years and reduce the weeds that compete with your plants. Apply mulch to moist soil and make sure that irrigation water penetrates the mulch and reaches the underlying soil. Planting vegetables closer together will also help shade the soil and reduce moisture loss.
Water at the right time and in the right way.Use drip irrigation to apply water where it is needed, and irrigate when wind and temperatures are low to reduce evaporation. Early morning is best; evening is second best. Probe your soil for moisture. If it feels dry two inches down, it's time to water.
Get to know the signs that your vegetables are thirsty. Rather than a “set it and forget it” watering routine, look at your plants. Are the leaves getting dull? Is the plant a bit droopy? Then it's probably time to water. Squashes and pumpkins are an exception; they often look wilted in mid-afternoon. As long as they recover in the evening, they probably still have sufficient soil moisture.
Give new plants a good start. Apply adequate water early on and then taper off.As the plants mature,water less frequently but more deeply to encourage deep roots.
Avoid or minimize your plantings of the “thirsty” vegetables. Corn, soybeans, squashes, pumpkins, most watermelons and some cucumbers require a lot of water. If you can't live without them, look for varieties bred for drought tolerance and consider planting “bush” varieties if available. Plants with less foliage will use less water. Good vegetable choices include tomatoes and pole beans. Both yield over a long season without requiring large amounts of water.
Shade your vegetables during extreme heat with an umbrella, shade cloth or floating row cover. Remove the shading as soon as temperatures return to normal; summer vegetable plants prefer at least eight hours of sunlight per day.
In late summer, plant a cool-season garden. Even with below-normal rainfall, cool-season vegetables such as broccoli, cauliflower and greens require less water. In a wet year, you might not have to irrigate at all after the plants are established.
Finally, if water rationing means that you have to choose, let your annual vegetables go and water your fruit and landscape trees instead.
What's your best tip for saving water in your vegetable garden? Leave us a note on our Facebook page. And if you'd like to learn more about the physiological adaptions that plants make to water stress, take a look at this blog post on the Master Gardener website: http://ucanr.edu/blogs/blogcore/postdetail.cfm?postnum=13978
Workshop: Napa County Master Gardeners will conduct a workshop on “Habitat Gardens at Home or School” on Saturday, May 16, from 9:30 a.m. to 11:30 a.m., at Skyline Park, Martha Walker Garden, 2201 Imola Avenue, Napa. Participants will tour the Martha Walker Garden to discover the plants and garden elements that attract bees, birds and pollinators. Master Gardeners will explain the value of habitat corridors whether the garden is in a rural, urban, or school setting. Online registration (credit card only) Mail-in registration (cash or check only)
Master Gardeners are volunteers who help the University of California reach the gardening public with home gardening information. Napa County Master Gardeners ( http://ucanr.org/ucmgnapa/) are available to answer gardening questions in person or by phone, Monday, Wednesday and Friday, 9 a.m. to Noon, at the U. C. Cooperative Extension office, 1710 Soscol Avenue, Suite 4, Napa, 707-253-4143, or from outside City of Napa toll-free at 877-279-3065. Or e-mail your garden questions by following the guidelines on our web site. Click on Napa, then on Have Garden Questions? Find us on Facebook under UC Master Gardeners of Napa County.
In February, your vines received eight to twelve inches of rain, depending on your location. The deluge was welcome but not even close to enough rain to say we are out of the woods. You can't put your grapevines on autopilot as you might do in wet years. You need a plan.
A smart draught plan starts with pruning, to adjust the crop size to match available water. In prior years, you might have left three buds per vine. This year, two would be wiser. If you didn't do this when you pruned, it's not too late. You can thin after flowering and fruit set.
You may have heard people talk about dry farming—growing grapes without irrigation—but that's a decision to make when you plant your vineyard, not as a response to drought. To dry farm, you need sufficient ground water and a rootstock that will send roots deep enough to reach it. Even dry-farmed Napa Valley vineyards may need irrigation this year as we haven't had enough rain to maintain ground water levels.
Grapevines are relatively drought tolerant, but insufficient water at crucial stages can compromise vine growth, fruit yield and quality. In the period between budbreak and flowering, avoiding water stress is critical. Vines use the water for root growth, establishing the canopy and determining the yield for this year and the next. Water stress between flowering and fruit set can result in poor fruit set, aborted fruit or smaller berries, all of which reduce yield. After fruit set, grapevines can tolerate moderate water deficits.
Before your first irrigation, make sure your system has no leaks andis operating efficiently. Irrigating at night will reduce evaporation loss by up to 10 percent.
Before irrigating,analyze the water content of your soil. Dig a few holes as deep as the longest roots. If the soil at the bottom of the hole is dry, you need to irrigate. If the soil is moist at the bottom, you don't.
Instead of growing a cover crop that takes water out of the soil, use mulch and compost to improve water retention. Control weeds that compete with vines for water. If you have dead or unproductive vines, don't replace them this year. Young vines require more water than established vines, so delay replanting until you know you can meet the new vines' water needs.
Be stingy with nitrogen fertilizer as nitrogen favors shoot growth over root growth, making vines more susceptible tolate-season drought. Monitor canopy size, limiting it to what's needed to ripen the crop.
Last but not least, thin fruit to reduce vine stress. Better to sacrifice some or all of the crop rather than permanently damage the grapevine.
Tomato Plant Sale: Napa County Master Gardeners will hold their second annual “Tomato Plant Sale and Education Day” on Saturday, April 19, in the South Oxbow parking lot on First Street in Napa. The sale will be held from 9:00 a.m. until sold out. All the seedlings have been started from seed and grown by Napa County Master Gardeners. More than 50 varieties of heirloom and hybrid tomato plants will be available. Master Gardeners will staff information tables on tomato support structures, common tomato pests and diseases, composting, good bug/bad bug displays and a mobile help desk. For a list of available tomato varieties, visit http://ucanr.org/ucmgnapa or call the Help Desk (hours below).
Workshop: Napa County Master Gardeners will conduct a workshop on “The Small Home Vineyard” on Saturday, March 29, from 9:30 am to 11:30 am, and from 12:30 pm to 2:30 pm. at the Yountville Community Center, 6516 Washington Street, Yountville. The morning session will focus on bud break to harvest. Learn the basics of managing a small vineyard including grape physiology, canopy management, vine nutrition, fertilization, irrigation and cover crop. The afternoon session will focus on identifying and managing the most common vineyard pests, especially powdery mildew. To register,call the Parks & Recreation Department at 707-944-8712 or visit its web site.
Master Gardeners are volunteers who help the University of California reach the gardening public with home gardening information. Napa County Master Gardeners ( http://ucanr.org/ucmgnapa/) are available to answer gardening questions in person or by phone, Monday, Wednesday and Friday, 9 a.m. to Noon, at the U. C. Cooperative Extension office, 1710 Soscol Avenue, Suite 4, Napa, 707-253-4143, or from outside City of Napa toll-free at 877-279-3065. Or e-mail your garden questions by following the guidelines on our web site. Click on Napa, then on Have Garden Questions? Find us on Facebook under UC Master Gardeners of Napa County.
Napa County Master Gardeners welcome the public to visit their demonstration garden at Connolly Ranch on Thursdays, from 10:00 a.m. until noon, except the last Thursday of the month. Connolly Ranch is at 3141 Browns Valley Road at Thompson Avenue in Napa. Enter on Thompson Avenue.