hot and windy and then there were six

Another set of hot, windy days.  Got up to 104F today before cooling back to 79 or so.  I'm getting my first real feel of just how brutal summers can be in Melbourne.

Yesterday I forgot to water my pots before going to work.  When I got home the whole garden was in a state.  The potted veggies all looked like these only WORSE, but I forgot to take a photo.  These photos are from today, even after they got water yesterday.

Some of the young growth on my rhodies has been fried as well as a bit of my designer twig.  Even my geraniums were struggling - geraniums!  They're so hardy they can take anything!  But they needed a bit of water to rescue them.

Surprisingly, one thing that was taking the heat were the marigolds I planted a few weeks ago.  They were wilty today but took yesterday's heat without complaint.

When we get hot northerlies we often get hot wind to go with it, which dries out the plants even more.  And it managed to break off yet another branch of my Yellow Pear tomatoes.  It did this once before and you would think I had learned to secure the branches better, but no.  So I was extra-careful today to secure all the leggy branches that had grown out too far.  I'm lucky I haven't lost any branches from the Better Boy, it's not as leggy but it's also not secured very well.

On top of that fun, I've lost two pumpkins that definitely had pollinated.  They grew a bit but then just stopped.  I've pretty much pinned it down to not enough water, and despite topping them up this week I've lost these two.  Which leaves me with only six pumpkins across two vines.  That's still plenty for just me, but it's disappointing seeing dozens of baby pumpkins fall off.

But I've learned so much that I'm determined next year will be a bumper crop!

Here you can see the difference between a full pumpkin and one that stunted and is now dying.