Its dry in Arkansas!

[tedln]

Ozark Lady,

Did you get enough rain back in September to help? We just got back from an ATV riding trip to Mena and I haven't seen it that dry ever. The entire area is under a burn ban which means no campfires, no fires in the fireplaces in the homes with fireplaces. Every day we rode in the mountains, we would get back to the lodge totally covered in dust. This is the same area in Wolf Pen Gap national forest where the Little Missouri River flooded earlier this summer drowning 21 campers. A lot of bridges and low water crossings washed out and those roads are still closed. The river rose from 3' deep to 25' deep in just a few hours at night while everyone was asleep. They need some rain bad before a forest fire gets started.

Ted

[gumbo2176]

Same thing in La., a burn ban has been in effect for a few weeks now with no end in sight. I went to central La. late last week to take my 83 yr. old father-in-law to get a radiation treatment in Alexandria and on my way up La. 1 they were harvesting cane out of the fields adjacent to the highway. The tan dust clouds could be seen for miles as the harvesters did their thing.

Here in New Orleans, I've been watering several times a week to keep my garden up and the seedlings healthy but my lawn is browning out. We had cooler temps last week but the 90 degree stuff is back again this week, but thankfully, the humidity is relatively low.

[tedln]

I reduced the amount of water my garden gets back when we started getting cooler weather. We were only in Arkansas for five days, but when we got home everything was bone dry including my garden. It was getting the set amount daily, but my beds were still dry. If I had left without any water going to my garden, it would have been dead. We got a nice rain last night of about 3/4", but we really needed it. I think our temps were close to 90 and today we are back in the mid 70's.

Gumbo, be glad you were not driving to Alexandria when they were burning the cane fields prior to harvest. Sometimes the smoke is so thick over the highways, you can't see where you are driving.

Ted

[gumbo2176]

[quote="tedln"Gumbo, be glad you were not driving to Alexandria when they were burning the cane fields prior to harvest. Sometimes the smoke is so thick over the highways, you can't see where you are driving.



I've been through those times when they are burning and it isn't pleasant but the worse thing for me was when I ventured up La. 1 on my motorcycle one year and the fields were wet.

The cane haulers drive their semi's directly into the fields to load up with the cane and then head on the hwy. to the plant. I got sideways on my bike going 60 for about 50 ft. because of the wet mud on the roadway. Luckily for me, there was no traffic heading in the opposite direction when this happened and I pulled out of it without a scratch. Of course, it almost took a pry bar to get the seat out of my butt due to the "pucker factor" of such an encounter. To this day I don't know how I didn't go down except to think I was being looked after by a higher power.

[Ozark Lady]

September was great. We caught up on the annual rainfall for the whole year in one month.

But alas, it didn't last. I am back to watering the tomatoes.

I am not watering the tobacco anymore. I want it to dry anyhow, so lack of water there just helps my goals!

None of the trees here are showing stress now, like they were back in August. But the drought did kill two large ones in August.

We are almost always under a burn ban. Seems this county wants to eliminate all outside burning, even if it is wet enough.

Compared with August, after 3 months of no rain, it looks like a rainforest still here for now!