What a challenge the weather has been for gardeners. The double whammy of 100 degrees-plus heat combined with the drought has kept us watering early in the morning and into the dark hours trying to save the garden, trees, shrubs and flowers, never mind the lawn it will have to make it on its own -- or not.

The newsletter Field Notes from the Kerr Center states that "Oklahoma Leads the Nation in Growth of Local Markets." The profits will be meager this year for the people who sell produce at the local farm markets, but remember that the freshness and healthfulness of the vegetables and fruits is worth the extra money.

At the best of times farmers' profits are slim, sometimes nil, especially when you factor in the hours that each worker spends in buying the seed, preparing the ground, planting, fending off insects and disease, watering, gathering, washing and preparing the tomatoes, okra and squash for the market, loading, unloading and a myriad other chores. It's a wonder that families continue the practice of truck gardening -- i.e. growing produce for the market. So, if you think the prices are high, just count the costs of growing and marketing those delicious squash, okra, tomatoes, beans and peppers.

I hope the tomatoes in your garden are still healthy. Last week the nights were too warm for the blooms to set fruit. Luckily most of my plants had tomatoes on them before the 80 degree nights. A Super Sioux and several Cherokee Purples have 7 or 8 fruit each. The Sioux I planted in the middle of the asparagus row following the advice of Louise Riotte (an Oklahoma author) in her book on companion planting "Carrots Love Tomatoes."

She advises planting tomatoes with asparagus to deter the asparagus beetle. Last year the asparagus beetles larvae kept their ferns eaten back to a brown stem so that the crop had little energy to push up spears even though I did my best to smash every dastardly little black and orange asparagus beetle and its larvae that I could catch.

The result of this pairing is spectacular; the asparagus is at last sending up good-sized spears while the tomato vine has thick limbs that are held upright by the asparagus plants. The tomato vines branch out in every direction for from 3 to 5 feet. Part of the success, of course, is that tomato plants have never been grown on the rich soil of the asparagus mound.

I've noticed for the first time ever that some of the tomato vines that don't have adequate leaves to protect them from the fierce sun are turning brown. If possible, shade cloth should be used over the top of the cage and facing south and west to moderate the extremely hot afternoon sun.

The summer garden ought to offer some pleasant times, it shouldn't be all work. Sunday evening at dusk, I paused at my chores to watch the birds that were seeking their last aphid or caterpillar while they could still see. There were two pairs of cardinals, a couple of brown thrashers plus their fledgling and numerous robins with their young searching eagerly for that last tidbit of the day. The cardinals and thrashers hopped in and out of the tomato cages catching small insects to take to their young while the robins searched among the leaf mulch for sow bugs and earthworms.

A pair of cardinals took advantage of a fluke of nature to build their nest. A while back when we had those horrendous winds, a ragged 6 ft. long narrow canvas lifted from the dumpster across the back fence, was flung across several bent limbs of a live oak and was snagged several in places by the oak's limbs. Under the canvas is where the cardinals built their nest. That seems to indicate to me that cardinals are quite intelligent; think of the extra protection the canvas gives them from sun, wind and rain.

Squirrels must be hungry because they've eaten or knocked to the ground all the apples and are fast demolishing the pears from the Keifer and have begun eating the immature green native pecans which are still soft-shelled. The drought and heat are hitting gardeners hard, but think of those that lack running water and A/C.

Betty Culpepper can be reached at bculpepper3@cox.net for comment, questions or ideas for future columns.