This year has been an incredibly dry one. Right now, the monsoon rains have begun and things are not as bad as they were during the spring and early summer (recall the AZ fires not too far away). When I arrived at the cabin a few weeks ago, I was pretty depressed to see how dry things were. The upside is that there are no weeds - none - zip. The downside is that trees in the orchard were suffering mightily. Only the lavender (see @ left) was doing well. I have an automatic irrigation system set up, but when your well runs dry, it doesn't do much for you. Yes, indeed, the well has gone dry. Not a surprise really. The well is about 40 years old and one of last shallow ones left in the valley (currently the pump is @ 35 feet). My neighbors are super nice and are letting me run a hose to their pump to keep my trees alive until I get a new well drilled. As it is, I lost seven trees - a tough blow. Being a biologist I can rationalize the loss in terms of natural selection - only the truly desert adapted will survive. Thank goodness I planted so many varieties.
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| Dead pear tree. |
I estimate the garden and orchard were without water for 3 weeks of 100 degree weather (and yes, that's quite normal for the Gila, not a heat wave). It's interesting to see how some of the trees are perfectly happy and some died a tragic death. The truly sad thing is seeing the shriveled fruits on the branches. Sigh.
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| Happy pear tree. |
The vegetable garden is a total bust. No beans and chile this year! As every gardener knows, each year brings different hardships and I'll have to start over once again. On the bright side, when I left, the indigo seedlings were doing ok. If the rains have been steady I might have some indigo plants to harvest. We'll see...
