The high temperatures are affecting tomatoes
What’s going on with tomatoes not ripening? Me, my neighbors, friends all over the state—we’re all are having the same problem. We have every kind of tomatoes: heirlooms, hybrids, cherry, beefsteak. Everything looks healthy, grows normal size, but they just won’t get ripe.
Very high temperatures can affect tomato fruiting. They stress the plant, causing pollen to die, blossoms to drop, and they can delay maturity and normal pigment production. I’d like native ground cover for some terraces along the water in full shade. The soil is sandy but has leaf mulch mixed in. The English ivy and vinca there now are all going. Would you recommend wild ginger? Where can I find native plants to buy?
Wild ginger will grow in sandy shade, as will white turtlehead, Virginia waterleaf, sweet cicely, creeping phlox (phlox stolonifera), and mountain mint. Several of our native ferns should work for you, including lady fern, sensitive fern and royal fern, plus others. An invaluable resource for planning natives is “Native Plants for Wildlife Habitat and Conservation Landscaping: Chesapeake Bay Watershed,” available online. It gives the soil, light and water needs of each plant in categories from ferns to trees. With good color photos and appendix lists for particular situations such as wet meadows or woodlands, this is a treasure trove. The Maryland Native Plant Society website provides sources for purchasing native plants. University of Maryland Extension’s Home and Garden Information Center offers free gardening and pest information at extension.umd.edu/hgic. Click “Ask Maryland’s Gardening Experts” to send questions and photos.
Digging deeper
Can you see it? That thickening in the tree crotch that looks like a lump of lichen? It’s the tiny nest of a ruby-throated hummingbird. Usually 10 to 90 feet high in trees or shrubs and only a couple inches wide, nests are clad with lichen to shelter two tiny eggs. Like a fairy tale bird, the hummingbird attaches its nest to the branch with threads of spider silk. The nest cup is lined with soft fibers of tree catkins, lamb’s ear leaves, and seed fluff from plants such as milkweed, ornamental grass and clematis. The male with its iridescent ruby red throat and emerald green back arrives first in Maryland. The female has a greenish back and white throat. Migrating a thousand miles round-trip each year to live and breed here from late spring to early fall, these amazing birds live up to 9 years.