• Continue side dressing your garden vegetables. Sidedressing with Fertilizer
• Apply the last dose of fertilizer to landscape plants. Do not fertilize landscape plants after mid-July as lush new growth may not have time to harden off before freezing weather arrives.
• Take soil samples from your lawn areas for testing to be ready for fall fertilization and seeding. Soil boxes are available at N.C. Cooperative Extension, Transylvania County Center.

• Set out plants of Brussels sprouts, cabbage, cauliflower, collards, pepper, eggplant, and tomato in mid-July. A Beginner’s Guide to Vegetable Gardening
• Begin your fall vegetable garden this month. Plant bean, beet, carrot, cucumber, leaf lettuce, head lettuce, mustard, rutabaga, summer squash, and turnip seeds. Start broccoli, cabbage, and cauliflower plants in peat pots to transplant into the vegetable garden mid-month.
• Re-pot overgrown houseplants.

• Prune "bleeder" trees including maple, dogwood, birch, and elm. Pruning trees and shrubs
• Prune the fruiting canes of raspberry and blackberry plants after harvest is over. Cut canes at ground level and destroy.
• Prune off dieback limbs on hybrid rhododendron, azalea, mountain laurel, and blueberry.
• Pinch old blossoms off of rhododendron. Pinching
• Remove browned foliage from spring-blooming bulbs.
• Trim hedges as needed. Trimming hedges
• Continue pruning white pines and narrow-leaf evergreens such as juniper early in the month.
• Remove faded flowers on perennials to encourage a second flush of flowers.
• Pinch your chrysanthemums the first week only!
• Do not prune spring-flowering shrubs after July 4.

• Monitor for insects and if needed spray the following landscape shrubs for the following insect pests: arborvitae (bagworms), azalea, and Pyracantha (lace bug). Shrub pests
• Spray for Japanese beetles as needed. Japanese beetles
• Continue with your rose spray program.
• Spray your tree fruits and bunch grapes according to your spray plan.
• Spray vegetables with fungicide if signs of fungus are present.
• Monitor for insects and if needed, spray the following vegetables if insects are observed: cucumber (cucumber beetle), squash (aphids), tomato, and eggplant (flea beetle). Vegetable pests control
• Spray woody weeds including poison ivy, honeysuckle, and kudzu with a recommended herbicide. Controlling woody weeds
• Watch for whitefly and spray with insecticidal soap or summer oil if needed.
• Control aphids by washing them off with a blast of water from the hose. You can also spray with insecticidal soap or horticultural oil if needed.

• Remember to change direction when mowing your lawn. Travel north to south on one mowing and east to west on the next cutting.
• Continue feeding your zoysia lawn with fertilizer. Do not fertilize tall fescue or bluegrass lawns this month.
• Maintain 3" mowing height on cool-season grasses.

• Continue to take semi-hardwood cuttings of azaleas, holly, rhododendrons, and many other shrubs.
• Divide and transplant your iris and daylilies after they finish flowering.

• July is a good month to see if and where your home can use some additionalshade trees and make notes for fall planting.
• Blossom-end rot may be seen on tomatoes this month. You can try a blossom end rot spray to help fruit that has not been affected. Consistent watering and adding lime may also help.
• In dry weather, both your vegetable garden and landscape plants will benefit from a deep soaking. Slow watering will penetrate the root zone better. Apply 1" of water early in the day.
• Weed in cloudy weather or the cool of the evening. Disturbed plants need time to adjust before being in the hot sun.
• Start planning fall bulb purchases for October planting.

Sourwood, Crape myrtle, Stewartia, Chaste-Tree, St. John's Wort, Abelia, Peegee Hydrangea, Rose-of-Sharon, Trumpet Creeper, Phlox, Butterfly Weed, Daylily, Red Hot Poker, Canna, Dahlia, Daisy, Summer annuals.