Lets hope .........

Here is a link that might be useful: Oklahoma Weather Tracker 10 Day

Dawn, please tell TIm I didn't use the 3 letter word....but that map looks kinda pretty too :)

Not trying to be cynical but I will believe it when I see it. I am tired of having my hopes crushed!!

LCDollar, We'll have to watch and see if the Euro shows consistency for a few days before I start buying into the idea of actual raindrops falling from the sky and hitting the ground.

Lisa, I think for Tim it is a four letter word, and you can guess which actual fourth word he'd add to it. I think he now believes it never will rain here again for as long as we live. I'm more optimistic. I expect it will rain here again sometime this year, if not this month.

Ricman, I feel the same way. I tried not to get my hopes up last time but every day the amount shown for us on the QPF went up, up, up and then we got almost nothing--barely a smidgen over a tenth of an inch.

I hope rain falls at the end of the week, and I especially hope it falls at my place, y'all.

This is the scary thought I'm facing here: If you remember how bad 2011 was....well for this point in the year, we have had a little over half as much rain in 2014 as we'd had by June 1 in 2011. That really bothers me because 2011 was such a bad summer. I cannot handle another summer like that one, so.....rain had better start falling.

Dawn

We need anything we can get out this way. The 4 inches we received was great but the garden is dry again. I have to water tomorrow if I want anything to be here for the rain next week.

Robert

Whew, buddy. We got it. Wish it were all over the state, tho. If it's any consolation, know that I'll be swimming in buckwheat for the next decade.

yes we got a ton this morning. Wasnt expecting that. Creeks and retention ponds filled up quick.

I'm glad ya'll got the rain, I know Bon didn't really get the amounts we got last week.

I got a half inch. Not bad, especially since I wasn't expecting it either :)

Now Dawn needs to get some rain.

Lisa

I kept watching the storm line. It ballooned from a line into a wide girth covering almost half the state. I was hoping for a miracle, but that's as good as it got. We close to 4". I haven't seen that much water in such a short time in years.

I just hate it when Dawn's not around. It tells me there's a fire somewhere. And I look it up to find it true. :(

No, no, no---no fires....not here, at least. Tim's run a few calls lately, but mostly medical calls or motor vehicle accidents. It has been very quiet lately, for which I am grateful.

We had a crazy, hectic day that didn't include much time for the garden or on the computer, but most of it was not VFD-related.

I am here now, and trying to catch up on everything.

Rain? Raindrops that fall from the sky? It sure would be nice. I watered my back garden yesterday, my front garden late today, and will water the front and back yards tomorrow. Oh, and we watered the soil around the house's foundation today. Usually if I break down and finally water everything, it sometimes then actually does rain.

We've had so little rain this year that I now refuse to look at the QPF because we almost never get what it says, and I am tired of getting my hopes up and being disappointed.

Dawn,

I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but your area is about to get upgraded to D3 on the Drought Monitor. It's crazy how dry you've been. If you continue to stay dry, you'll be at D4 soon. I'm slightly optimistic that you'll get something from the system later this week and/or the one early next week.

Lee

Lee,

You know, that's not the sort of upgrade that makes my heart sing. If we are going to be upgraded to something, can't we be upgraded to first class instead of coach when flying or something? : )

Seriously, thank you for always telling me the truth, even when there is a good chance it might make me cry. (I'm not crying yet.) Your comments confirm what my eyeballs are showing me and what my brain is telling me.

I could detail a thousand different ways the wildlife and the plants have been showing us for months now that things are going from bad to worse here, in terms of rainfall, but I'll just say it is not a big surprise to me that we are about to be upgraded to D-3. I've been expecting it for a couple of weeks now, and have been pleasantly surprised each week when I look at the Drought Monitor and south-central Love County still is in D-2, although western Love County (as I am sure you already know) has been in D-3 for a few weeks now.

I have had to make some really hard choices in the garden this year, and let some things go in the corn cage (built to keep out the raccoons) because I decided it would be too hard to keep the corn and beans there watered. The sandy soil in that area is so dry it is like a fine dust....like flour. There's no way I could water enough in these conditions to keep those plants happy, so they are no longer there. I am not even going to try to keep a cover crop alive there. I think I'll just put down a couple of layers of thick cardboard and pile hay on top of it to prevent wind erosion.

We bought fruit trees in March to plant, but gave up on the idea of rain falling from the sky a couple of weeks later and planted them in large molasses feed tubs, feeling that they'd die if we planted them in the ground. It is getting to where that is our standard MO any more---to grow newly-purchased young trees and shrubs on to a significantly larger size in molasses feed tubs before they go into the ground. This gives them a better chance of surviving the inevitable droughts.

Our local Co-Op Weather Observer is only a couple of miles from our house, and our rainfall generally is very similar to his--or at least closer to his than to what is recorded at Burneyville. This year, when I look at his numbers in our little weekly newspaper, I cringe every time. Through the newspaper's deadline of May 27, he had recorded the following: May 0.98" (Ave precip for May 4.98"), Total for 2014 Thru May 27 4.93" (Ave precip for year thru May 15.45"). Those are the kinds of numbers that are so bad that they are just stunning. Even in 2011, we had so much more rain by this point in the calendar year, although we'd also been a lot hotter.

I am fighting hard for every plant in my garden, but the handwriting is on the wall, and I know its life will be painfully brief this year and I'll have to fight the weather and the grasshoppers for every bit of the harvest.

In situations like this, our only big hope for rain is for a nice tropical cyclone to hit the Texas gulf coast or the part of Mexico very near Texas and then send the remnants of that low over Texas towards us carrying rain. Hermine brought us great rain a few years ago, but I think it was in September. We usually don't get cyclone relief rains until August at the earliest, in the years when we get them at all. I'm clinging to some really slim hope here, but at this point even slim hope is better than no hope at all.

I bought paint to paint my potting shed. If attempting to paint the shed doesn't make it rain, then I'll start making plans to paint the house.

Dawn

Dawn - I'm so sorry you haven't received any rain yet. We are so thankful of the 4 8/10" of rain we received last month. That is basically all the rain we have received this year. For the first time in at least a year, I can actually see green grass in our pastures - short, but green! Here's good thoughts and prayers for all of us to get more moisture soon.
Mary

Edited to correct for clumsy fingers!

This post was edited by gmatx on Tue, Jun 3, 14 at 16:18

Mary, Thanks. It will be okay. I am used to being in drought in the summer months.. In the rare years when we have good rainfall all summer long, I am giddy beyond belief. It looks that won't be an issue this year.

Usually, what gets us through the summer in any sort of half-decent shape is the spring rainfall. This year, the spring rainfall failed us, so summer is likely to be very bad here. We certainly cannot do anything to make it rain, as you know so very well from having experienced similar droughts in recent years, so we'll just have to deal with it.

I am so happy for you that y'all got all that rain, and my hope for you is that you get lots more. It was long-needed rain for y'all there, much overdue for your area, and not nearly enough in comparison to how huge your rainfall deficits are. I am glad you see green, because even short green is better than brown.

We actually have some green now in our front pasture and back pasture, likely from rain that fell about three weeks ago, but closer to the house where we keep the nearest edge of the back pasture mowed down short as one way of protecting the barn and garden from wildfire, the grass and weeds are totally brown, except for the green milkweed which still has a little green in it. Tim wants to mow the front and back pastures short for fire protection and to make snakes more visible, but I know that if we do, they'll brown out again since there isn't any rain falling to green them up. We didn't cut them this weekend, so they get to stay green another week.

We are close enough to the Red River that we have huge numbers of wildlife, particularly deer and venomous snakes. I measure how dry it is by how many deer come sniffing around the compost piles looking to see if I have thrown anything on the piles that they can eat. I also measure how dry it is by how many venomous snakes are getting way too close to our feet. Based on the deer/snake index, it already is mid-July at our house, and you know how lovely mid-July is in hot and dry TX and OK.

My grandmother, who was born in 1898 and lived through the dry 1930s and 1950s in Texas, knew well that we cannot do anything to make it rain when we need rain. When someone (usually my grandfather who farmed/ranched back then) was fretting about the lack of rainfall, she'd calmly remind them that you cannot do anything about the weather, so you might as well not worry about it. My mom reminds me of Mamaw's words every now and then when I'm talking about the lack of rainfall. I wish I could adopt my grandmother's attitude, because I do worry and fret and hope for rain that I know most likely won't come.

I've only planted about half of my available garden space, so to some extent, I'm as prepared as I can be for this drought, and I added extra compost to the most important areas before planting this year, and have been adding more mulch to planted areas every week. There is only so much you can do, though, and I don't want to have to irrigate endlessly and to run up huge water bills. Oddly, since I am the gardener and Tim is not, you'd think I would want to keep watering, watering, watering and he would be wanting me to stop it. It always is the other way around though. I start talking about turning off the irrigation to this zone or that zone and he tells me to keep on watering and that he'll let me know when he thinks it is time to stop. (I don't know that he'd ever think it is time to stop watering though because he grew up in Pennsylvania and is used to green plants in summer, but I grew up in Texas and am no stranger to brown summers.)

We'll just keep on muddling our way through the dust and the brown crunchy grass, while always hoping for but not really expecting enough rainfall to give us mud and green grass.

Oh, and I forgot the cow index. You can measure how dry it is by how many cows are escaping from their browning pastures and roaming the roads and bar ditches looking for something greener. The cow index is going up daily. In our worst year, I was in the front garden one day and looked up and had a herd of about 20 cows running right for me and the garden's then-dinky-little fence. It has a much stronger, sturdier fence now, so I believe it is safe from escaped cows.

Dawn

I'm glad there were no fires.

That last sentence really hit home, Dawn. The other day, one of the new neighbors came by a said "you have a cow out". These are some of the "city people" who have recently moved out to the country. When I asked him what size it was, was it big or small, he said "well, it wasn't real little, but not real big either". Turns out it was one of the bull calves that is about 5-6 months old. He was out in the bar ditch grazing away. This was the same neighbor who when I first met him I told him not to try to make friends with our Beefalo bull if he got out. Not that the bull is mean, he's not, but because he'll take you hand off nearly when you hand him a range cube or handful of weeds or grass! That boy has a BIG mouth. I wasn't about to tell him that as I personally want any neighbors who do not have any experience with livestock to leave the cattle alone. Out Beefalo girls and boys are gentle toward us, but you have to respect them.

I was a city girl when we moved here but had spent time at my grandparents' ranch and, later on, their home in a very small, rural city when I was a kid. A week at the ranch was the highlight of my summer, but my most vivid memories all seem to involve me being chased by rams with those big curled horns (being about 4 years old I ran into the stock tank and stood there waiting for my grandfather to come rescue me, and when he did, I had leeches on my legs) or by a bull that liked to chase me up a tree while my grandfather was fishing and I was "watching" him fish. I remember lots of other things, but they didn't involve livestock.

When we moved here, I was shocked at how often goats, horses, cows and donkeys find ways out of their pastures and into the roads. We quickly learned how to stop and herd the cattle back in, or at least how to get them out of the road before someone hits them. After living here a while, we knew whose cows were whose and who had goats or whatever so we knew who to call. We always try to stop and put the livestock back up, because we know their owner is legally liable if someone crashes into one of them....and it is not a pretty sight when a vehicle traveling at a high rate of speed hits a cow in the road at night. No one here just drives by livestock that is out running loose without trying to put them up, find their owner, etc. That is one of the things I like about living here---the way everyone helps each other.

We don't have livestock, but I enjoy watching our neighbors' livestock in the fields. If there is anything cuter than baby goats playing together, I don't know what it would be. (Maybe the only thing cuter is baby lambs.....). My garden and I have been "terrorized" by cows and goats a couple of times, but we've managed to chase them back home before they've done much damage.

We are the city slickers who moved to the country, and I am sure we entertained our neighbors a lot when we first moved here, but they were quick to accept us, befriend us and make us feel like we'd always lived here. We're in our 16th year here and it is harder every year to remember what life is like in the city. I missed Fort Worth horribly at first and still thought of it as "home" in our early years here, but over time, that all changed. I still miss the people we knew in Fort Worth, but it has gotten so big and so heavily populated, and the traffic is crazy---and I don't miss that part of it. Oklahoma has been "home" for quite a long time now and I never intend to leave it, but it'd be more fun living here if it would rain a little bit more.

Dawn, Aaron Tuttle has a very pretty map that is predicting very nice rain right on top of your house. If I was less lazy I would save it and post it for you :)

I won't quote the number, but you would like it :)

Lisa

It is really shocking how fast we have gone from green and pleasant, to browning off and HOT. Today there was a very strong south wind, with a hint of smoke in it. I was thinking of Dawn and hoping that everything is OK. Summer has definitely arrived in South Central OK. Wouldn't you know it, when we turned our A/C on for the first time today, we found that it has died and we will have to buy a whole new system. So we'll have a few hot nights with box fans in the windows to look forward to in the meantime!
Flis

Flis, Yes, it was a little wildfire. The firefighters were down on Brown Springs Rd from roughly 1 pm until sometime around 6 pm. I got home a little after 6 pm. It was burning in heavy brush in sandhills and pastures---that sugar sand they have in the Thackerville area near the river that fire trucks often get stuck in. At one point we had 2 different fire trucks stuck in the sand. It got to the point that they couldn't go fight the fire because they they kept getting bogged down in sand, so we spent a lot of time waiting for the fire to come out to the road....which it really didn't do because the wind direction kept shifting. We were at such a low elevation there that radio and cell phone communications were difficult and, at times, impossible. It was a yucky afternoon. The thermometer on our VFD suburban showed 110 degrees and we were parked in the shade, but at home the Mix-Max thermometer only hit 99, and Burneyville was 96. I guess summer is here! Most of the volunteer firefighters were at work or otherwise not available, so they had to page out 7 fire departments to get enough personnel and trucks. It was a very trying fire. It wasn't big---just impossible to access. The intial assessment was 10 acres burning upon arrival of the first fire unit, but I don't know how much ultimately burned. Even the dozer had trouble climbing some of the sandhills to cut a firebreak. As I type this, one group of firefighters is back out there putting out a little area that flared up and started burning again.

I am sorry to hear about your AC system. That is terrible. Every summer I hold my breath and hope ours will make it through one more summer.

I was rushing around like a crazy woman after I got home trying to take care of all the animals, water some small plants, check on the garden, feed the wild birds, put water in the birdbath, etc., and had a rather unsettling encounter with a timber rattler in my garden. We sent him to the Happy Snake Hunting Ground, or wherever they go when they die. He was feisty and put up quite a fight, but letting him live another day wasn't going to work because if I knew that snake was in my garden, I wasn't going to step foot in it for the rest of the year.

This is our family's ninth snake encounter of the year, with 8 of them being venomous snakes. Two cats were bitten, and both survived but it was touch-and-go for a while. Our old mama dog, Honey, was bitten by a venomous snake last night, but I think she is going to make it. She was miserable and in a lot of pain and had some swelling in her paw since then, but she seems to be in great spirits tonight---much more so than last night.

So.....let's run thru the Love County checklist.....wildfire.....air conditioner death....snake encounters with bites....hot and dry with strong wind gusts and no rain. Green rapidly turning brown. Ridiculous June temperatures. Chiggers, skeeters, biting horseflies and red wasps. Yep, it's summertime, and it is just about all I can stand. I am starting to miss the winter weather.

Dawn

Wow, Dawn-- your day's traumas make mine look insignificant! I'm glad that the fire was brought under control, and let's hope that there's a good long lull before the next one. And that the next one is easier to deal with!

We too have had an unusually high population of snakes up here so far this year, but not so many venomous ones as you've had. Mainly enormous but largely harmless snakes which have somehow been getting into the chicken house and traumatizing the hens.

Only 4 (or so) more months of summer!

Flis

This is the worst snake year I can remember since moving here in 1999. Every time I turn around, I find a snake, and generally too close to me. Tim picked up something off the ground in the garden last week and there was a coiled-up copperhead waiting to strike at him. It was about 4-6" from his hand but he got back away from it quickly and it did not strike. A couple of hours later, I was at the water faucet just outside the greenhouse washing out a bucket and I turned off the water, turned around to go to the house, and there was a copperhead a couple of feet away. First, I stepped back about 4' to get out of striking distance. Then I called Tim on the phone and said "I have a copperhead out here". If I had stepped back from the water faucet without turning around, I likely would have put down one foot either on top of that snake or very close to it. Our next-door neighbor was bitten by a copperhead a few years back and it was a slow, painful recovery. Still, they don't scare me the way rattlesnakes do. The timber rattler tonight was rattling like crazy. All these snakes are making me incredibly jumpy.

Tim thinks the heat/drought are driving the snakes into the yards and gardens from the fields and forests because the yards and gardens are greener. If that is the case, it likely will be a long, snakey summer. I cannot "unsee" a snake I've seen in the garden, so it is really a struggle for me to feel comfortable in my own garden for the next few days after I see a venomous snake in there.

I hope to have a totally quiet and uneventful day tomorrow so I can work in the garden very early in the morning and get inside before it gets insanely hot.

I think you win the prize, though, for worst day with the AC going out. My little snake problems are minor compared to that. My friend, Fred, used to tell me years ago that I was going to get bitten by a venomous snake some day merely because I spend so many hours outside every day. Ever since then, I've been trying to prove him wrong about that. So far, so good, but if ever there was a year in which I was likely to get bitten by a pit viper, this may be it.

Dawn,

The loss of the A/C isn't worrying us too much. We've seen it coming for quite a while. Every summer, we wait until we absolutely can't stand it another minute before we turn on the A/C for the first time, and for the past 3 or 4 years, it hasn't worked. We've had to get "the guy" out to fix it, and each year they say that somehow all the freon leaked out, but they can't figure out where. They get it going again (for big $) and it works all summer, and then next summer the same thing happens. This year we decided to be a little smarter and give it a trial run BEFORE the temp got over 100º-- and sure enough, not a drop of freon again. So we are biting the bullet and getting a complete new unit. Surely that's better than paying $800 each June to get it going again. Meanwhile, we are pretty used to sweltering in the heat, as we are outside so much of the day anyway, so we can make it through until the new one is installed. We survived here quite happily for 15 years with no A/C at all (our house was built in 1926, so it was designed to stay cool). It still feels like a bit of a luxury to us.

After your post about all the snakes, I realize that I need to be more careful than I have been about sticking my hands into places I can't see. It makes perfect sense that they would be moving into our watered gardens and yards and lurking under the foliage. Yikes.

We replaced our air conditioner a few years ago and the difference was amazing. We are cooler, it doesn't run as much, and the bill is less. Good luck with yours.

Dawn - Wow, it's amazing as to the number of snakes you have already seen this summer. I guess I had better be really thankful that I haven't seen a single snake this year so far!

We use to have a big bull snake that stayed around here for several years. He stayed in the garden in the summer and during the early fall, before he would go to wherever he spent the winter, he would stay out under the beautiful blue Rocky Mountain Juniper tree that we just had to have cut down. Now DH hates snakes with a passion. I don't care if they are alive, dead or even rubber snakes. Do not get in his way if there is a snake involved in the situation, as he will be going right over or through you to get away.......

Luckily we do not have copperheads here, but we have good old diamondback rattlers. I need to be more careful outside since we have received some rain and the weeds are growing which makes a good place for snakes to hide. Those noisy guineas need to stay diligent on the job, don't you think? Thanks for the reminders folks.