Summer Vacation Survival Plan for Our Plants

Like many times before, the weather forecast called for rain. But this time our eucalyptus tree was swaying frantically in the wind and dropped a branch. Dan rushed outside to clear the gutters so we could harvest every bit of the long awaited rain. 

We were hoping to get a new cistern connected before we left on a family trip to Wisconsin the next day. And now we were racing the first storm of a delayed monsoon season, too. 

Dan had ordered some parts to connect a 425 gallon cistern to collect the overflow from our 200 gallon tank. During a heavy rain, the 200 gallon tank wasn't big enough to hold all the water that flowed from our neighbor's huge roof.  Hoping to get the cistern installed before the downpour, Dan had made a soft bed of sand for it to sit on and rolled the 425 gallon cistern in place on plastic pipes.

Unfortunately, the necessary parts didn't arrive before we had to leave. Neither did the rain. 

It finally rained 0.03 inches on July 2nd, just after we left for our trip. We were sad to miss it. 

But preparations for the trip had begun days before. Our "drought tolerant" plants were already suffering from weeks of extreme heat.108 degrees the day before we left on our trip! If my precious plants were to survive for the 11 days that we would be gone, I would need to deep water some - even if that took some city water.  I left the hose running on low to deep water my scorched palm tree and the surrounding agaves a few days before. 

Our droopy Mexican honeysuckle (that usually lived on rinse water) got similar treatment. 
 

I used the remainder of the rainwater in the big 500 gallon cistern to deep water the struggling pomegranate, curry, and moringa trees.  

(Dan drilled 2 small holes in each of the 5 gallon buckets to release the water slowly.) 

 

Our poor moringa had suffered greatly from the long dry winter, and the freeze (among other things.) It just needed it to make it until the monsoon rains started - when we knew it could grow 6 feet.  We gave it 15 gallons of rainwater the day before we left and covered it with shade cloth to protect it from the July sun.   

But I was really worried about my new pollinator plants (Arizona foldwing and spiderwort shown below) that needed nearly daily water in this heat.  Of course, being planted in the rain basin doesn't do a lick of good if it doesn't rain. 

Luckily a new friend came to the rescue - offering to come over daily and water those special plants and some recently planted veggies and newly sprouted herbs in our little garden! That was a great load off of my mind. 

So off we went to Wisconsin to hang out with family. 

But being the water nerds that we are, Dan did a presentation on "A Story of Water in the Desert" for Sustainable Tucson while we were there. 

We needn't have worried about not harvesting that extra rain in the overflow tank. It hadn't rained much while we were away. Sadly, the basin was bone dry, but everything in it survived thanks to the loving care of our neighborhood angel.

Dan went right to work hooking up the new cistern. 

Just in time, too! Three days after we got home we got three days of rain! 1.03 inches worth!

The spiderwort pollinator bloomed in the basin...

The Mexican honeysuckle plumped right up with orange hummingbird trumpets. 

The moringa has grown a foot so far...

The first big rain refilled our 500 gallon cistern, so we needed to use up some so there would be room in the tank for more. 

Jar collects every last drop in the hose

After deep watering the fig tree, pomegranate, moringa and curry, we went ahead and gave the mesquite on the high end of the basin 6 buckets of rainwater, even though we normally don't water it at all. After all, it was supposed to be a big wet monsoon this year.... 

 

We celebrated collecting all that rain with a new sign: "This Home Harvests the Rain." 

#lovemyrainbasin

Surviving the "Nonsoon"

Tucsonans have developed many theories on how to bring forth the monsoon rain. Some claim washing their car will do the trick. Others swear it's deep watering their trees. A Facebook friend urged me to use the last bit of water in my rain tank that I reserved for my veggie garden. (I had already gone through most of the water in four cisterns and two fifty-five gallon rain barrels.)  So...despite proclaiming that I don't use any city water for my landscaping on the six o'clock news last spring, I finally broke down and deep watered my jujube trees. It stormed that very afternoon... 

You're welcome!

Gardening in this extreme weather has been very humbling. I have struggled to balance conserving water during our current water crisis and keeping my poor plants alive in this unrelenting heat.

I've lived in Tucson nearly 30 years and I have never experienced anything like this. (The drought the year before last came the closest.)  I try to get up early enough to water my little veggie garden before it reaches 80 degrees (the temperature when evapotranspiration stops on some plants), but most days the temperature never dips below 80 degrees - even at night! Some evenings it has gotten as high as 90 degrees! That's bad news for people and plants. And it's NOT normal. In the old days, Tucsonans slept on the roof after the house got too hot. When we first moved to Tucson it stormed every afternoon during monsoon season. 

Nonsoon? I don't know. We finally got a couple of monsoon storms, but by mid-morning the ground is bone dry. My poor plants! Unfortunately, we had to take out our pest-infested eucalyptus tree, so our "desert adapted" heritage fruit trees have no protection from the scorching sun. I finally put a shade contraption over our little fig tree.

But despite getting up at 5:30 am and cooling it off with a can of water (not to mention regular deep watering), it just withered away. Keep in mind that it also gets greywater from our outdoor washing machine. But we had the dilemma of when to wash our cloths - since it never got below 80 degrees while we were still awake. We finally started the laundry just before bed anyway. (We were out of underwear...) 

You'll be happy to hear we had better luck in our front yard. We've been fortunate to go as long we did without using city water. Our rain basins had sunk in enough water to keep them going.

The jujubes are thriving in their basin. Apparently jujubes are very drought tolerant. Perhaps it's their shiny leaves. I just wanted to make sure they had plenty of water to promote fruit growth.

Sadly, I waited too long to deep water the moringa in our right-of-way basin. They are tropical plants that should take the heat, but without enough moisture they were really suffering. The recent monsoon rain (and some deep-watering) has done wonders. They are coming back with some new sprouts. 

Most of our desert plants are hanging in there. I finally had to give a little water to the pricky pear and agave. All of the desert trees (mesquite, sweet acacia, and hackberry) fared well on the high end of the shallow basin. Since the two monsoon storms they are really flourishing. Have I mentioned I #lovemyrainbasin yet? 

The mesquite tree acted as a nurse plant protecting the hackberry and saguaro cactus from the sun as well as providing nitrogen to the soil. I went ahead and picked some volunteer mesquites that were sprouting under it.  

And after two storms and some sprinkles, life is springing up in the basins! I found tepary beans (from last year) sprouting under the jujube tree. It is odiously tepary bean season, so I went ahead and planted more for ground cover in the garden.

Horse purslane is starting to pop up too - a welcome sign that monsoon season is here. It will act as living mulch and add much needed organic matter to the basin!  

We are enjoying the common purslane that I propagated in our yard! (That cage kept the critters out long enough for the purslane to spread and grow).

Celebrating the (late) start of monsoon season with a purslane scramble breakfast burrito. I think we deserve it for surviving the nonsoon!  (So far.)  I think we will be O.K. That big storm pretty much filled up our rain barrels. Hopefully there will be enough water to get us through the rest of the nonsoon. 

Racing to get our cisterns installed before the monsoon storms

Dan and I have been anxiously awaiting the rain - while hustling to get our last two slimline cisterns installed to take advantage of the rain that falls on the Southwest corner of the house.

This happy moment has been a long time timing. It's been quite a process. It's taken years to get where we are. First, we had to dig up all the plastic and two feet of gravel from the yard and replace that with catchment basins covered with organic mulch and bunch grass. The catchment basins work beautifully to create rich soil and hold water for our native food forest.  But we also wanted to plant some heritage fruit trees in the back yard, so Dan set up a greywater system from our outdoor washing machine with its own basin. And then I started gardening, so we needed water for that. We started with two fifty-five gallon rain barrels and then added two cisterns (one using the water from our kind neighbors' roof).

It took a while to get the parts and for Dan to find the time to put in our final two cisterns. Last year, Dan optimistically put in the gutters and downspout.  

Dan finally managed to get all the parts he needed for the used cisterns and got to work cutting plastic piping, and gluing them together with PVC cement then installing baskets and covers on the cisterns. 

The next job was to level the ground where the cisterns would go.  Dan was racing against time to get the cisterns in before the monsoon storms. Unfortunately, he made an unexpected discovery. He found pavers hidden under the ground that he spent two afternoons digging up. 

He didn't quite get them out before the first big downpour... We tried to catch what we could by putting buckets under the downspout.  After that bone dry June, we cherish every drop. 

With our hot weather, it didn't take long for the ground to dry.  So Dan got right to work the next day digging out a base for the tanks. He made sure it was level and tamped to make the ground firm. 

Dan gathered sand that had washed into the street from the nearby Arcadia wash. 

There were all these sprouting seeds in the sand, so Dan and I sifted through it to get rid of them and the sharp rocks and glass that might puncture the plastic tanks. 

After spreading the sand out evenly over the hole, Dan made sure it was level. This is important so the tanks don't end up tipping. 

Dan had to hustle on the next workday. He was racing a possible storm. The wind was blowing hard. 

Dan had already cut and placed three PVC pipes across the base and was ready to roll the tanks in place when he found out one tire of the hand truck was flat. So he had to pump it up every time he used it.  

He used the hand truck to put the cistern on top of the PVC pipes (by himself!) 

Then he rolled the cistern into place under the downspout. I finally got to help by pulling the pipes out as Dan lifted the tank.  He repeated that process with the other tank and made sure the tanks were level.  (He uses his level a lot!) 

Dan put the two tanks together with the flex connector.  They lined up just right! Yeah! 

As the wind picked up, Dan changed the direction of the downspout to go over the basket in one of the slimline tanks. 

He added some length to the downspout to direct the water to the opening in the tank. 

There were still some final touches to put on the tank (like a hose bib on the second tank) but it was getting dark. At least we would be able to get the rain from the impending storm.  

But alas... it barely sprinkled that night. 

The next workday, Dan raced to complete the job before the rain.  

I'm so proud of my guy! He got the slimlines installed just in time to catch 3/10th of an inch of rain! 

Needless to say, we celebrated catching all that rain! What a joyous day! 

Wanna share the joy of  rainwater harvesting?  Learn how at Watershed Management Group's and SERI's rainwater harvesting rebate classes.