Mulches are critical to preventing
moisture loss in warm climates.

Advice for Warm Climates

• When danger of frost is past, set out warm-weather plants such as tomatoes and peppers. Sow seeds for squash, beans, corn, and melons.

• Mulch beds with organic matter to discourage weeds and keep the soil from warming too much and too soon.

• Use shade cloth or polyspun row cover fabric to protect young transplants from strong sun.

• Harvest cool-weather crops, such as lettuce and broccoli, before hot weather causes them to bolt and set seed.

• Water when rainfall is sparse. Most plants need about 1 inch of water per week. Tomatoes like even more moisture.

• Mulch all bare soil in the garden to prevent evaporation of moisture and to discourage weeds. Renew the layer when it decomposes.

• Monitor plants for insect problems and begin controls immediately.

• Plant succession crops of beans, carrots, and corn as you harvest earlier crops.

• Erect shade cloths over plants to shield them from the afternoon sun, even if they're sun-loving varieties; most benefit from some shade in the hottest months.

• Renew beds for fall planting by adding more organic material such as compost and rotted manure.

• Sow carrots, beets, and other root crops as well as lettuce for fall harvest.

• Set out cole crop transplants such as cauliflower, Chinese greens, cabbage, broccoli, and mustard. Shade them if the days are still warm.

• Clean up plant debris in harvested beds. Mulch to protect the soil over the winter.

• Build more boxed raised beds. Repair trellises.

• Look through mail-order and seed catalogs in time to start cool-weather crops indoors.

• Continue to enjoy lettuce and Chinese greens by protecting them in a cold frame or with polyspun row cover fabric, or a plastic tunnel.

• Get out seed-starting equipment and order peat pots and other supplies.

• Plant peas.

• Build new compost bins or repair old ones. Turn and consolidate compost piles to prepare for the new season.