I'm bringing down seeds of green beans (how will these do?), canteloupe, basil, onion, tomato, and a few others for the group. Basically, I "bought out" the dollar store here in Palm Springs.

As you can imagine, there's not a lot of gardening here in the desert unless it's flowers or fruit trees.

I thought about growing some tomatoes in pots on the porch. Has anybody had any success with this?

Everyone....please let's support our garden club and keep this thread going.

Tomatos grow well if the soil is good here. In a pot with a small trellis should do excellently.

I used to bring seeds down all the time for a friend. She had several kinds of melons, green beans, squash, zippers, and a few other things. She constructed an area, covered with screen and fencing, used potting soil, and had a great little garden.

Ray Auxillou in Santa Elena (Cayo) has been growing a lot of tomatoes in containers. He says that the hot weather recently has not been good for his tomatoes and that he has lost a lot of them. He suggests varieties that are more resistant to heat if you are growing them during the hottest months.

--Lan Sluder

We have had luck growing melons on our property. Fed our pet Spider Monkey, Ricky Lake, watermelon...thus the melon patch.

I was growing melons but the land crabs loved them. As to tomatoes , there is a hybrid out now that is bred for tropical climates and it does really well in San Pedro. It also tolerates the salt pretty well. The problem when it is really hot is that you get flowers but they do not bud in to tomatoes easily. Ash helps a but when mixed in the soil and water water water. Oh, and do not plant next to habaneros or you get hot tomatoes.

Its almost a magic trick , if you cut palmetto leaves and stick the stem in the ground surrounding your plants the crabs and lizards won't go . I don't know why. I've seen this work and the people doing it seem to be pros.

Nobody, and I mean nobody, loves a big ripe jucy red tomato more than this writer. I come from California and the area of the Sacramento Valley where summer temperatures reach 115 and above, yet, each year I grew some of the most succulent tomatoes ever seen. Heat can destroy your plant but if you use good growing practices, a good hybrid variety, mulch heavily to keep the soil cooler, water sufficiently but not too heavily, perhaps even do a little hand pollinating with a Q-Tip, you should succeed. I'll be growing my own in the ground, in pots and elevated beds in the partial shade of my place in Armenia Village once I become established sometime in Late July and early August. Will keep you advised of my success and/or failure. I'll be bringing down a ton of seed from the US when I arrive in July.