Early August

 The arrival of August shift us into the next phase of planting for winter eating. August 1st is the halfway point between Summer Solstice and Fall Equinox-- Lammas, in the Celtic and old British calendars, a harvest festival in which bread baked from the first wheat harvest of the year was blessed. Bread blessings sound good to me! The shortening of the days means that seed can be sown for overwintered onions (Onions are sensitive to day-length and might bolt to seed too early if planted sooner). Walla Walla is the main variety grown in this area-- a large, delicious onion that will be ready for harvest around July 1st next year (OK, it's not exactly winter eating, but it does fill the gap left by the last of the stored onions, before next year's crop will be ready). Seed a few rows in any spot in the garden, cover with a little protection against the worst winter weather, then transplant next spring into that year's onion area.

You can sow all the Asian greens now for fall harvest, plus fall and winter lettuces, arugula, kale, winter radishes, spinach, scallions and corn salad. Corn salad, also known as mache ("mosh"), is especially hardy, and works well as a cover crop as other things get harvested.

Tips for seedling survival in hot weather: If your soil dries especially quickly, so that daily watering is not enough to germinate seeds, try covering the seeded area with cloth or a couple of layers of newspaper. Check each day and remove as soon as the seeds have sprouted. After this, to shelter the babies from too much sun, I've been using upturned bedding plant trays, those lattice-work black or grey plastic trays that a dozen or so small pots come in from nurseries. They let in about 50% of the light. They turn up at the Free Store, or maybe a neighbour has a few spares, if you don't have any. Shade cloth would work, too.