I’ve been hearing bits and pieces on the news all week about record breaking temps and climate change, but none of it really hit home until I saw this graphic. That’s a lot of drought.
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Our garden is gorgeous this year (tall, lush, heavily producing) for a couple of reasons…care and attention, drip irrigation, tons and tons of mulch (in the form of straw) and our warmer than normal winter and spring which allowed us to plant much earlier than normal. Our corn is 3 feet taller than it was at this time last year. The potatoes are already flowering. Our yard is like a jungle. And the bugs? Oh man, they’re everywhere!
Our monsoons have begun, which means we’re getting at least some rain on most days. This is a welcome respite and can almost make one feel as though there will always be rain and moisture to ease our parched existence. I can almost forget the past 6 months of virtually zero moisture that fell from the sky.
But, the truth is, if it weren’t for my ability to walk over to the spicket and turn that bad boy on, I would not have a garden. I would not be able to grow my own food or keep chickens. Not here. Not now. And rain (or a lack there of), is just the tip of the iceberg. So much is changing…
So, what does this mean in the long run? I’m not really sure. How do I really step out of my comfort zone and figure out how to better affect change on my tiny little plot? I don’t have the answers right now, but I do intend to start (and keep) looking harder. Consuming less and producing more is a great approach, but the bigger picture involves so much more.
Water is such a gift, and so scary when there’s not enough of it! This is one reason I’ve re-thought our growing space, with the hope of drastically reducing irrigation. We water from the pond, but that dried up very early into the season this year. It’s refilled trickle by trickle for the time-being, but I’m still having to supplement majorly with well water. Fortunately we’ve had a little rain, and nothing makes the garden happier than water from the sky 🙂
-Jaime
I imagine that, when thinking about using well water, one would want to be as intentional as possible so as to maintain your water levels for as long as possible. Actually, maybe that’s the perfect perspective to take…maybe if we all imagined our (city)tap water a limited resource like personal well water, we’d all be a bit more careful with it?
You’re right, though…water form the sky is such a blessing in so many ways!!!
Yes, the farm where we buy our grassfed cow milk is having to feed hay to the cows, because the grass is just not growing without any rain. It’s scary, and yes, definitely makes me consider what I am producing and consuming.
Ugh…the prices of everything are going up…drought affecting grass and feed (and veggies) which then affects milk and meat prices…and the taste of that milk and meat. It’s hard to keep up with what’s sustainable when the cost is high…and that’s when it’s so very important to support what’s sustainable. Stinkin’!
I live in a very drought prone environment too. At the moment wwe have water due to La Nina but it wont be long before El Nino returns and we are back to severe water restrictions and everything turning brown. I have a water tank but that isn’t really enough unless it rains regularly enough to refill it. It is scary and its hard to see things getting radically better in the near future. Ah well perhaps I’ll just enjoy the moisture while it lasts.
I think about our rain barrels all time…they’re really great as long as it’s raining…but then, when it’s raining, you don’t need the water! Sometimes our caught water evaporates before we can use it! So yes…definitely enjoy the moisture while you can!
scary stuff. we too have a water bill through the roof this time of year… and our garden is humble to say the least. it’s too shaded and our tall tomatoes have barely a fruit. still we water. and harvest. next year, we have to move our garden to the sun or move ourselves out of this high desert! 🙂
Ugh…we think about it all the time. One of our eventual options is to move to Missouri (Tool Lady’s old stomping grounds) where the land is cheaper and much wetter…but then we’d have to live there 😉
What’s really scary is that the situation is actually much worse than that graphic shows. I remember seeing something about that graphic that it shows the places where there has been severe drought for at least 8 weeks. So it doesn’t include all of those places, like where I live, that have been lingering in the moderate drought category until this week when we finally went over the edge into severe.
And of course, there is rain in the area today- just not at my house 🙁
Judy
Yes….I do believe that the information we’re pulling together now is really just the tip of the iceberg…there’s still so much for us to understand.