What to sow when summer is already hot

If you garden somewhere hot, you have probably felt the early-summer slump: the spring crops are bolting, the soil is warm, and it feels like the planting window has closed. It has not. It has just changed shape.

Lettuce and spinach are done for now, and that is fine. Let them go. What loves this moment is everything that wanted warm soil all along: another round of bush beans, summer squash, cucumbers, and a second sowing of basil that will carry you to fall.

The trick in a warm zone is to think in two seasons, not one. The heat that ends your spring greens is the same heat that sets your tomatoes and ripens your peppers. And while you wait out the worst of it, you can already be starting the fall crops that need a head start indoors.

Open plant and check your zone. The calendar will tell you which window you are actually in, because “early summer” means something very different in zone 5 than it does in zone 9.