Finally cracked why my tomatoes kept dying after that master gardener talk at the county fair

I was at the county fair last month and a master gardener pointed out my drip irrigation was running at noon instead of dawn, which was literally cooking the roots under the summer sun here in Phoenix, and now I'm wondering if anyone else has had a simple timing fix save their whole garden.

3 comments

3 Comments

gracethomas9d ago

Oh man, you just reminded me of something I went through last year with my peppers here in Texas. I had this totally different issue where I was watering at dusk thinking it would save water, but it was actually leaving the leaves wet overnight and giving them this terrible powdery mildew. I switched to watering at 6 AM and it was like a whole new plant, seriously they just perked up and started producing like crazy. I mean, my soil wasn't getting cooked like yours, but the timing thing was absolutely the key. It's wild how something so simple can make or break everything when you're gardening in a harsh climate. Idk why it took me three seasons to figure that out.

young.ryan9d ago

Funny how the simplest change makes all the difference.

corah758d ago

I mean, you say simple change but your whole story was about switching to 6 AM watering, which is a whole routine overhaul. Idk, sometimes "simple" is more complicated than it sounds.