BELFAST, Maine — Throughout much of Maine, once-green grass is burned and brown and ponds, lakes and streams are shallow and bony — all symptoms of the abnormally dry conditions affecting more than half of the state. Although welcome rain fell this week, there is a lot of moisture to make up, with rainfall in the first half of August still well under normal in cities including Portland and Augusta.
And even though the livelihood of home gardeners does not depend on how well their gardens grow — which is not the case with Maine’s worried farmers — the drought is affecting them, too, according to a gardening expert with the University of Maine Cooperative Extension.
“We’ve had really dry and hot weather,” Caragh Fitzgerald, an agriculture professor with the Kennebec County extension office, said this week. “That can lead to a variety of changes in plant performance. If the plant doesn’t have enough moisture, it doesn’t have enough water for the fruit.”
That can look like sour tomatoes that seem seedier and less sweet than usual; dry, undersized blueberries and shriveled, misshapen cucumbers, she said. There are things that gardeners can do to try and alleviate problems caused by the lack of rain this season, but one of the first — and perhaps hardest — things to do may be to pull back and take stock.
“In some cases, people may need to make some tough decisions,” she said, adding that factors to consider include the cost of water or concern about private wells. “One of my kids said that he’s not going to take a bath, he’s going to take a shower, because he wants to water the tomatoes. It’s something that gardeners are talking about, and it’s good for kids to understand how our natural resources are used and what we can do to conserve.”
Fitzgerald said that home gardeners should evaluate their gardens and think about which vegetable crops are particularly important to them — and which ones will still benefit from additional attention at this point in the growing season. When gardeners have decided which crops they want to prioritize, the expert suggests getting mulch to put down between the rows.
“Clean straw, old leaves or old newspapers — something that will hold soil moisture when you do water,” she said.
Another important tip, she said, is to remove weeds from the garden, which soak up the water that could go to plants. And when gardeners do water, they should do so wisely.
“Don’t use a sprinkler. In a sprinkler, the water is more likely to evaporate in the process of watering,” Fitzgerald said. “Soaker hoses are really good. They put the water right at the base of the plant, just above the root zone so it will sink in. A lot of times folks will hand water. That’s okay if you don’t need to water a lot, if you don’t have a big garden.”
The dry conditions have minimized some garden problems, such as mildew, she said, but not others, such as pests. For example, limp leaves on squash and zucchini plants may be caused by squash bugs, by bacterial wilt or by drought stress. It can be hard to tell at first sight.
“But gardening’s fun, right?” Fitzgerald said, tongue only slightly in cheek. “When people get stressed out with their gardens, I try to bring them back to why they’re doing it. For many people, gardening is fun. It’s a hobby.”