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Heat collapse
The only good thing about working for five hours in temperatures of 98F is that it makes returning home to temperatures of 'only' 80+ degrees feel pleasantly cool... According to the thermometer strip in my bathroom, my body temperature is currently 102, which under any other circumstances would count as running a fever!
The first thing I had to do was fill and carry all my water carriers out to the plants. The basil and pak choi had collapsed, as had the heritage tomatoes, although the latter may have been as much to do with the strong hot wind as anything else -- they are not really staked or tied, and are getting too tall to manage without. Surprisingly, the Demon Red chillies which were positioned between the basil and pak choi seemed to be fine. They are now quite definitely coming into flower, although still only about six inches high :-)
The symptoms of extreme heat are, weirdly enough, remarkably reminiscent of those of hypothermia: slowness, clumsiness and fumbling, brain fog that means you can't make intelligent decisions, and generally walking around like a zombie... I kept putting water over my bare arms and shoulders, but it just evaporated off in no time at all because both the air and my body temperature were too high -- sitting here at lower temperatures I'm actually covered in visible sweat for the first time. Previously it just didn't get a chance to pool anywhere except my groin!
Edit: I repotted the basil (three seedlings in one pot) once it had recovered from its collapse. It was so pot-bound that it's really not surprising it flopped -- there can have been very little actual soil, as opposed to root, in there! There was no separating the plants, so I just ripped them apart, with each chunk presumably containing a fair proportion of severed roots originally belonging to the others...
The first thing I had to do was fill and carry all my water carriers out to the plants. The basil and pak choi had collapsed, as had the heritage tomatoes, although the latter may have been as much to do with the strong hot wind as anything else -- they are not really staked or tied, and are getting too tall to manage without. Surprisingly, the Demon Red chillies which were positioned between the basil and pak choi seemed to be fine. They are now quite definitely coming into flower, although still only about six inches high :-)
The symptoms of extreme heat are, weirdly enough, remarkably reminiscent of those of hypothermia: slowness, clumsiness and fumbling, brain fog that means you can't make intelligent decisions, and generally walking around like a zombie... I kept putting water over my bare arms and shoulders, but it just evaporated off in no time at all because both the air and my body temperature were too high -- sitting here at lower temperatures I'm actually covered in visible sweat for the first time. Previously it just didn't get a chance to pool anywhere except my groin!
Edit: I repotted the basil (three seedlings in one pot) once it had recovered from its collapse. It was so pot-bound that it's really not surprising it flopped -- there can have been very little actual soil, as opposed to root, in there! There was no separating the plants, so I just ripped them apart, with each chunk presumably containing a fair proportion of severed roots originally belonging to the others...