"simy1" wrote:

so how do you manage to garden if you don't mind me asking? restrict
type of veggies, use only certain super resistant hybrids, daily
irrigation, monthly fertilization?

The main trick is to garden in the winter, when the pest levels are
lowest and the heat doesn't stress the plants. The second trick is
regular (read automated) irrigation, as you suggest. And yes,
fertilizer can get leached out quickly, depending on the plant,
monthly fertilizing may be needed. Sterilizing (solarizing) the soil
is supposed to help with nematodes, but I never had great luck with
that. My experience is that once there is an area of soil that won't
grow stuff properly, I might as well give up on it. We had some muck
brought in one year, which should be great for gardening, but even the
grass has a hard time growing where it was deposited - this after over
ten years.

I was stunned the first year when I put out heavy mulch, and within
less than a year it was all gone as if it had never been there. The
decay of cellulose and conversion into carbon dioxide is amazingly
fast in the heat and humidity, and adding organic material to the soil
has only short term effects.

Some plants do much better in garden boxes with hardware cloth over
the top. DW does the gardening here. After my having a prolific
large garden in Vermont that was ammended each winter with a couple of
spreader loads of manure, I don't have much interest in gardening
here. Asian weevils eat at a lot of the leaves and have no real
predators. Coons, possums, squirrels, iguanas, feral cats, various
birds, and canal rats are all active most of the year, so the safer
plants are broccoli, collards, peas and beans, and kitchen spices.
Anything that becomes fleshy or sweet rarely survives to the table.

Fortunately, many fruit trees and vines can do fine, so we have
mangoes and passion fruit, and are growing lychee, loquat, and finally
some citrus again.

I'm sure other people have better luck, and know better how to garden
here. These are just one set of experiences.

I do know one thing though, I don't miss digging in the New England
clay and hardpan.