Not exactly. At least not in San Antonio in August.
Our cherry tomatoes stopped setting fruit in late June (when the daytime temperatures were consistently above 90° and the nighttime temps were above 75°).
Ending the season in June is fine with me. By then, I've had all the tomatoes I can eat (and give away) and I start to loathe the idea of going outside and poking around the humid jungle looking for mediocre fruit.
The trouble is that when the season ends, the mess remains. For a few weeks now, Travis has been removing one tomato plant at a time, but this weekend we teamed up and bushwhacked the entire bed.
We encountered tons of flying leaf footed bugs (bastards!) as well as scale and spider mite damage.
Look at this little nymph injecting its digestive juices and ruining the fruit. These picture are from early July when the bug population was lower and the tomatoes weren't struggling as much. By yesterday, there were thousands of bugs in the bed, not to mention mosquitoes eating us alive while we worked.
For a more immersive look at the mess, check out Travis' video.
It's getting old isn't it?! I don't mind the heat so much but this drought is excruciating...Don was a dud here. Did you get any rain?
ReplyDeleteDon gave us a little shower, three-tenths of an inch. It didn't do much for the yard (when I stuck my finger in the mulch, it was dry below), but it is filling the aquifer and keeping us from entering Stage 3 water restrictions.
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