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A few days ago I first realized that the riverbed is about half dry now, which is damned early. It's kind of cool for the dog -- dogs, actually, because I have the brother-in-law's clueless dog Roxy for another almost two weeks -- because the dry part of the riverbed is glorious to run around on and the river is running slow and safe and shallow so they can wade to their heart's delight. There are flowers blooming in that sand I swear I have never seen before, though they are vaguely reminiscent of other natives and other thugs I have seen before. There's something growing there with a sweet fragrance, too, though I was never able to spot what it was.
Other signs of summer: the Watsonville hillsides are totally brown. The seedheads on the extoci wild grasses are ripe or nearly ripe. We've gotten our yearly water warning. But this year it's more than a warning: we're on stage 2 water restrictions, which are not onerous but are more ominous. We can only water on 2 days a week, depending onoiur house number (or other named factors if those don't apply), before 10 and after 5, except you can always use drip or a wateriung can or a shutoff hose. What's left? sprinklers and open hose ends, that's all. You can always water food crops if you need to, if you use a watering can or a shutoff.
This is the third dry year in a row. Not so dry in itself: 76% of normal. But last year was a nearly-not-dry 81%, and the year before 50-something.
There's nothing unusual about this. As the nice fellow used to say, if you bet every year that it would be drier than average, you would make money over the long run. And not so long run, actually.
But we did get spoiled with about a decade of good wet years, green and juicy, and we got out of the habit of worrying about our water. Or some of us did, anyways.
Other signs of summer: the Watsonville hillsides are totally brown. The seedheads on the extoci wild grasses are ripe or nearly ripe. We've gotten our yearly water warning. But this year it's more than a warning: we're on stage 2 water restrictions, which are not onerous but are more ominous. We can only water on 2 days a week, depending onoiur house number (or other named factors if those don't apply), before 10 and after 5, except you can always use drip or a wateriung can or a shutoff hose. What's left? sprinklers and open hose ends, that's all. You can always water food crops if you need to, if you use a watering can or a shutoff.
This is the third dry year in a row. Not so dry in itself: 76% of normal. But last year was a nearly-not-dry 81%, and the year before 50-something.
There's nothing unusual about this. As the nice fellow used to say, if you bet every year that it would be drier than average, you would make money over the long run. And not so long run, actually.
But we did get spoiled with about a decade of good wet years, green and juicy, and we got out of the habit of worrying about our water. Or some of us did, anyways.