As I post this, it's raining. What a delightful sound to hear the raindrops on the roof and water running in the gutters.
I checked my weather diary and confirmed that, with the exception of a few light (and I mean light) showers, we haven't had any appreciable or measurable rain since June 29. This is not atypical for the west, which is why fire danger is always on our radar during the dry months. It's also why the rain is such a welcome relief.
Today's rain is coming in a single dramatic spike.
But we have the promise of more rain and unsettled weather for the foreseeable future (i.e. the 10-day forecast).
The oak leaves are dripping water.
The porch rails are wet.
Some turkeys are taking refuge under an apple tree.
The road is running with rivulets of water.
And by evening, the blackberries will plump up.
Everything is looking fresher and cleaner since all the vegetation is having a bath and the dust is washing off. Yes, this rain is a relief.
Being west of you in eastern WA i totally understand the relief felt at getting rain. I had never before had a garden respond to the fire season like it did this year. We had ash, not just smoke about 4-6 weeks here and the strawberries started to not produce at all, tomato plants stopped getting taller and though nice and green and getting more leaves, fruit did not set until we had a rain storm go through on the 26th of August. Not really long or hard, just during the night. But it cleared the air or smoke and ash. Temps got warmer, plants looked cleaner, no more ash on them and fruit started setting on them. This is the first year we have had the ash so it surprised me. Also it work up the gophers who decided they really liked my few strawberries that did mature and the carrots which were under ground. So currently as we put to bed one section of the garden we are putting in raised beds with hardware cloth under them to keep the gophers out of them. No strawberries for over 6 weeks and now they are coming in about 3 cups every 5-7 days. Just enough for us to east and not put any up for the winter. But we have a new row or raised beds ready to transplant strawberry plants to in the spring and sharing the rest slowly until the row is empty. Everything will be in raised beds from now on. Told hubby I was said we had to buy garden soil since we had worked so hard for the last 15 years improving the clay we lived on which is nice and productive now. He said we will continue to improve what we put in the beds but at least we will get the food now instead of sharing it every year with the critters.
ReplyDeleteGod is good though and gives us just what we need!