Vegetables

• Slugs will hide during the daytime beneath a board placed over damp ground. Check each morning and destroy any slugs that have gathered on the underside of the board.
• Growing lettuce under screening materials will slow bolting and extend harvests into hot weather.
• Place cutworm collars around young transplants. Collars are easily made from cardboard strips.
• Week 1: Set out tomato plants as soils warm. Place support stakes alongside at planting time.
• Weeks 1-2: Plant dill to use when making pickles.
• Weeks 2-3: Place a stake by seeds of squash and cucumbers when planting in hills to locate the root zone watering site after the vines have run.

Fruits

• Mulch blueberries with pine needles or sawdust.
• Weeks 1: Don’t spray any fruits while in bloom. Refer to local Extension publications for fruit spray schedule.

Lawns

• Keep bluegrass cut at 1.5 to 2.5 inch height. Mow tall fescue at 2 to 3.5 inch height.
• Weeks 2-4: Mow zoysia lawns at 1.5 inch height. Remove no more than one-half inch at each mowing.
• Weeks 3-4: Zoysia lawns may be fertilized now. Apply no more than 1 pound of actual nitrogen per 1000 square feet.

Ornamentals

• Pinch azaleas and rhododendron blossoms as they fade. Double flowered azaleas need no pinching.• Study your landscape for gaps that could be nicely filled with bulbs. Mark these spots carefully and make a note to order bulbs next August.
• Fertilize azaleas after bloom. Use a formulation which has an acid reaction.

Miscellaneous

• Birds eat many insect pests. Attract them to your garden by providing good nesting habitats.
• Weeks 3-4: Sink houseplants up to their rims in soil or mulch to conserve moisture. Fertilize regularly.