Emma,

You can grow almost anything in a 23-gallon pot, though I wouldn't try any sort of vining winter squash or pumpkin in a pot that size. Some of the bush varieties could work, though.

So, since almost anything would like a pot that size, here's the planting dates for warm-season veggies for a fall harvest.

JULY 1-15:
Tomatoes (yes, technically it is too late, but in OK we usually can get fruit even from tomato transplants planted through the end of July, and with pots that can be moved into a sheltered area when cold weather arrives, that is doubly true)

JULY 15th (again, with a pot you can get away with planting after July 15):

Sweet Corn
Eggplant
Pepper
Tomatillo

JULY 15-30:

Pole Beans
Pumpkins
Winter Squash

JULY 15 -AUG 1:

Southern Pea/Cowpea
Cilantro

JULY 15 - SEPT 1:

Summer Squash

AUG 10 - AUG 20:

Bush Beans
Lima Beans
Cucumber

If you're more interested in cool-season crops that can be planted in August, let me know, and I'll list the planting dates for them.

We're gotten about 0.75" of rain so far today, so not lots and lots, and undoubtedly not enough to pull us out of Moderate Drought, but that's okay. I don't really want oodles and oodles of rain right now. It would just ruin the flavor and texture of all the watermelons and cantaloupes that are ripening.

Yesterday I picked all the tomatoes that were at the breaker stage so I wouldn't have to worry about heavy rainfall ruining their flavor or texture, or causing cracking or rainchecking.

Our rainfall for the year-to-date is a smidgen above our average annual rainfall through the end of July, so I'm not complaining. It is nice to have some rain without getting too much. I noticed that some parts of OK have had up to 5" (western OK!) in the last 24 hours and I am thrilled for them, but also am happy heavy rain like that did not fall here. The lake levels in most of western OK are still tremendously low and they need lots of rain to fill those lakes. This week's rain will help those lakes a great deal.

I wonder if Leslie's garden is under water over there near Lawton? I hope not! This is the first time I can remember that Lawton has had this kind of rain in July.

I hope the flooding in the already-saturated areas is not too bad and that all this rain doesn't bring disease. I feel sorry for all those folks whose power remains out. With the heat and high humidity levels, it must be miserable....not to mention having all the food going bad in the freezers and fridges. That would be so frustrating.

With your beefsteak tomatoes, I am not sure what you're using for support to hold the limbs up and keep the fruit off the ground. Cages? Stakes? I use cages, and when limbs grow beyond the cages and are heavy with large fruit, I use stretchy surveyor's flagging tape to tie the limbs up to the cages to keep the fruit above the ground.

I have all my young fall tomato plants in containers on the covered patio because wet foliage + hot weather often =diseases, so I wanted to keep them out of the rain and keep the foliage dry for as long as possible. I caught rain in my rain barrels and then used it to water the plants a while ago. They get morning sun until noon and then shade thereafter and are blooming and setting fruit on the patio, so I'll leave them there until the heat breaks for good sometime in August, and then I'll move them out into full sun. Our summer weather can be brutal on young plants in the fall garden, but then once it cools down in late August or early September, it is the most glorious growing season.

Dawn