Barnegat Garden Club

06/09/2026

06/03/2026

I love when a veggie garden looks pretty and works hard 🌿 A few design habits I like:
🥕 Raised beds make planting, watering, and harvesting feel much easier.
🫘 Trellises and obelisks are perfect for climbing beans, peas, cucumbers, or even small squash.
🌸 Mixing flowers with vegetables makes the garden feel less plain and brings in more pollinators.
🍓 Strawberry borders are one of my favorite ways to soften the edges of a bed.
🌿 Herbs are great near paths because they’re easy to snip while walking by.
✨ I like to plant tall crops in the back, medium plants in the middle, and low growers near the front.
A little structure makes the whole garden feel more peaceful and easier to care for 🌱

06/01/2026

June isn't late. It's the second planting window — and for heat-loving crops, it's the RIGHT window.
Everything on this list goes directly into warm soil now and produces before the season ends. No indoor starts. No transplants. Seed to harvest, timed for summer.

- Bush Beans — 55 days. Sow every 3 weeks through July for continuous pods into September.

- Cucumber — 58 days. June-sown cucumbers avoid the early-season cucumber beetle wave that kills May transplants.

- Summer Squash — 50 days. The fastest fruit producer from seed. June sowing means August harvest with fewer vine borer problems than May plantings.

- Okra — 55 days. Needs hot soil to germinate. June is better than May in most zones. Produces harder as temperatures climb.

- Yardlong Bean — 60 days. Heat-loving climber that barely grows below 75°F. June is when it finally wakes up.

- Sunflower — 70 days. June sowing means late August bloom — extending the garden's color and bird-feeding season into fall.

- Basil — 30 days to first harvest. Direct-sow now into warm soil. Germinates faster than April indoor starts did.

- Dill — 40 days to harvest, 70 to seed. Sow now for midsummer harvest. Succession sow every 3 weeks because it bolts fast.

- Malabar Spinach — 55 days. The heat-proof spinach substitute. Won't germinate until soil hits 65°F. June is its month.

June-sown crops miss the early pests, skip the cold-soil stall, and finish before frost. The second wave often outperforms the first.

04/28/2026

I’ve always thought a yard feels a lot more useful when it grows something you can actually eat instead of just giving you more grass to mow 🥬
🌱 Even a small patch can grow a lot more food than people expect.
🍅 Raised beds are a simple way to turn lawn space into tomatoes, peppers, lettuce, or herbs.
🥕 I usually tell people to start with what they eat most, so the space feels worth it right away.
💧 Food gardens take care, but at least they give something back.
☀️ If you have room for grass, you probably have room to grow at least a little food too.
To me, a yard feels a lot more rewarding when it grows dinner instead of just grass.

03/05/2026

If your garden gets full sun and summer heat cooks everything, these are the “don’t baby me” bloomers. ☀️🌼

A few easy wins for better results:
🌱 Plant when nights are reliably warm and water deeply for the first 2–3 weeks so roots go down. After that, let the top inch of soil dry before watering again.
✂️ Deadhead zinnias, cosmos, and blanket flower to keep blooms coming.
🐝 Add at least two types for pollinators and longer color, like butterfly w**d + coneflower + black-eyed Susan.

Soil tip: even tough flowers do better with a little compost mixed in at planting time. It helps hold moisture without staying soggy.