Drought: So what if?

I m able to water but the high heat day after day is stressing my plants, except for the tomtoes and peppers, Im going to be drowning in them.

Not many garden crops can take high heat day after day weeks on end. That what we are facing - Oh were in for a cool down for two days all the way down to the high 80s, Yippie

Long story short.

For some reason I moved to the high desert to homestead. All I was thinking of was cheap land. I got here and learned my knowledge on growing things was near useless here.

I say this to share the thought that if you know what your doing, you can garden through about anything. It would take me a long time to fully explain just how, but I studied things like soil building, and agro forestry, biochar and permaculture, and most importantly the things many many past cultures did in arid regions. So I can best direct the water where I want it and keep it there, along with having crops bred for such things which I do myself.

All this becomes a lot trickier if your in a usually wet area and it gets dry. But there is way more you can do then most people first think of. If its something that interests you truly dig into the topic there is a wealth of info. Honestly I couldnt share a single source that covers it all. Or I would link it.

A few things I find particularly useful you might not think of at first are...

Use rocks for mulch. Use this in addition to not to replace regular mulch, they work in tandem. Do this for perennial spots atleast, but if you use rocks about baseball sized and above I dont find it overly difficult to do on annual beds as well, and it cuts down on weeding. (weeds also rob water from the soil) Sun and wind are impenetrable to the rocks, and water goes right by. Your soil will stay wet a lot longer, Ive also noticed a multiplier effect of sorts from larger rocky areas, I assume since the soil next to a row for instance dries out faster and wicks a bit a way, and a larger spot has areas staying wet a lot longer. So I mulch my paths with rocks as well.

Winter wheat,barley, and rye. If you grow your own grains, consider winter types as well depending on where you are of course. If you dont already use them. Perhaps if summer precipitation fails winter precip will not.

you might purposely cultivate wilder plants as well. For your greens anyway. Ive got a bunch of them. Even the ones I need to water to get them to work here dont need much. From a prepping perspective they are also often more nutrient dense and known by less people.

I even align my rows up in such a way (with berms which themselves serve a few purposes) that they collect more snow onto the rows I will be planting in spring.

the specific varieties or crops you grow is a big deal as well. From building micro climates to having the right varieties you can get by on a tiny fraction of the water most think. To many variables for me to really paint the pic Im getting at here. Think of this, the hopi dryland farmed corn on literal sand dunes. If they knew all the variables they could have altered they could have done lots better, but my point was that they fed themselves in as dry of conditions as any of us are likely to face.

Seriously though, if its a topic your concerned about dig into it. (and breeding or varieties for such conditions) there are many manipulable variables that are usually ignored. Dont stop at any single source, Ive found none to date to cover it all. People farm some of the harshest conditions on the planet dwarfing any concerns we currently face generally knowing only a fraction of the ways to maximize an areas potential. If there is a will there IS a way...

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I have a high desert arid mountainous climate. Working towards self sufficiency. The potentials of plant breeding and building micro climates amaze me. We must learn to ride the wave.

The best way that I know is to walk around tall weeds and brush at night time with a flashlight. Late in the evenings grasshoppers climb up tall objects to roost during the night and are easy to catch if you shine a light on them and then quickly grab them while blinding them with a light.

Instead of eating the grasshoppers, I would rather use them for fish bait and eat fish for dinner instead.

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r.h. in oklahoma

Raised a country boy, and will die a country boy.

I diverted excess rainfall into my private lake, starting in 2000. It took two years to fill, and, in a complete drought, it should last at least 5 years.

If your talking about diverting water across country, it's going to take some major death tolls for that to happen... it'd cost many hundreds of billions, and not all areas are in drought at the same time... and, convincing those folks that are water rich, to de-water themselves, for others, is folly.

Last year was bad, but not as bad as the Texas drought of the early fifties, that lasted years. As bad as it was last year, a large area below my pond stayed damp, and I'd imagine that's where all my gardening would take place, in an extended shtf/teotwawki drought world. I'm already considering 're-orcharding' to this area... keeping the old one, but everything 'new' goes there.

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Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity. Seneca
Learning is not compulsory... neither is survival. W. Edwards Deming

Our soil is mostly clay underneath the layers and layers of compost and mulch we have added for the last several years. I pull that mulch back and plant the seeds. When the seedlings get high enough, I push the mulch back around the plant. In some areas, there are six inches of mulch but in others I haven't done as well. So far, even in the 100 degree heat and lack of rain in June and the first part of July, we have only had to water one time.

The type of soil you have and lots of mulch go a long way in keeping a garden alive during drought. Gardening by only tilling the soil each year and not adding the mulch, does very little to help the soil retain moisture. Not sure if that helps answer the OP, but it seems to work for us.

Our mulch consists of the free stuff our county has from yard waste. I let it sit in large piles and then put it on the garden......just in case weed seeds and nasties need to be cooked before they go on my garden area. There are sometimes large limbs in it, but it all breaks down really well even after it goes on the garden.

Nope. I've decided I'm quitting and getting off that soap box now. No lectures will be forthcoming from me about water conservation anymore. That should make everyone happy and relieved.

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That was a great post silverseeds, lots of good information.

What you were saying about using the rocks, I've been doing that in all my large outdoor perennial plants in containers too. There are multiple benefits. Less weeds, less fungi or mildews in the soil around the roots, the containers don't need to be watered as often and the soil and roots don't get disturbed when I do water them. Also the layer of rocks provides additional insulation and protection to the roots from the elements during winter, and birds or squirrels can't go digging and scrounging around in the soil in the containers.

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Well, sure..... let us off the hook now that there's no water left to conserve.

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“I would remind you that extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice! And let me remind you also that moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue.” Barry Goldwater.
III

i started watering the garden, but my plants are NOT fond of our city water. must be the chlorine or something in it, but they didn't respond well, so i gave up. luckily, we have had rain recently.

Nope that's not going to help me much. As I mentioned in my opening statement, I have plenty of water. If I was set up I could flood the garden everyday using the water out of the creek that runs by my house. But what my problem is, is the plague of grasshoppers everywhere. I would need a crop dusting plane to spread poison in about a mile circular area to control the number of grasshoppers that are flourishing due to the extreme heat/no rain weather.

Crop duster! Now that would take a lot of money. Probably more then the garden would be worth. Not to mention the electricity bill for the arrigation system.

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r.h. in oklahoma

Raised a country boy, and will die a country boy.

Forerunner, water is still there in the Ogallala right now. But it's being depleted so quickly and not being recharged so the estimates are it will all be gone in 10 years. That will leave 5 of the plains breadbasket states without that aquifer and with no more agriculture. But they know that and they're not concerned so I guess nobody else should be concerned either.

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