I don’t remember Jesus mentioning all the lovely lawns he saw
during his sojourn in the desert, where the Devil does his gardening.
John Fleck tells us that the Rio is not so Grande these days in The Duck! City.
In point of actual fact, it is dry. As in no longer flowing. Just enough mud for a smallish election; p’raps a school-board contest.
Notes John in a subsequent post:
Between the levees, the river in 2022 has begun drying in the Albuquerque reach for the first time in four decades, as we grind through the summer of our third consecutive terrible spring runoff. By one measure I’ve been using, this is the worst three-year stretch here since the drought of the 1950s.*
*When Your Humble Narrator was hatched.—Editor
Now, some of that green in our lawn pictured above is courtesy of the 2022 monsoons, which are supposed to resume this week. But a lot of it came spritz-spritz-spritzing out of our sprinkler system earlier in the year, when the sun was doing its Death Star thing on our back yard.
I guess even a dumb dog can see a Milk-Bone by daylight. Because Herself and I have agreed it was long past time we engaged a landscaper, and today she picked up the phone.
We’re gonna rock out, is what. If we absolutely have to have grass we can get it from the cannabis shops like everybody else.
Tags: cannabis, John Fleck, North American Monsoon, Rio Grande
Mad Blog Media 
July 25, 2022 at 2:22 pm |
Oh yea! I can see the sign in the front yard. Lawnmower, cheap, inquire within. Good on yous guys!
July 25, 2022 at 3:04 pm |
Our mower is coal-fired (electric), but I probably won’t be letting it go. I want to keep a small patch of grass near the living room to help keep us cool.
July 25, 2022 at 8:53 pm |
And, it will be nice for a pup to laze around on.
July 25, 2022 at 2:28 pm |
Been thinking about that too, but kicking that can down the road as rocks mean more heat and we have enough heat islands in Fanta Se and the Duck City. Maybe white reflective rocks?
July 25, 2022 at 3:07 pm |
That’s why we rang up the landscapers. It’s an outfit whose work we’ve admired around the ’hood and we don’t want to crank up the heat any more than necessary. I’m hoping they’ll have some ideas.
We have two tall pines, an ornamental plum, a worthless ornamental peach, and a maple for shade, and I think keeping a small patch of lawn on the east side of the house might be smart. The kitchen (SW side) has been as hot as the hubs of Hell since we had to take down a decaying crabapple tree.
But the rest of this bushwa gots to go.
July 25, 2022 at 4:01 pm |
I’d be happy to let the front of the house go to whatever survives there after killing the sprinklers. We have a very small patch of grass in back where we spend time outside, half a dozen fruit trees, the grape arbor (anyone for grape or apricot jam?) and all the raised beds. Those we want to keep.
July 25, 2022 at 3:44 pm |
Several recent articles in the Denver Post and C-Springs Gazette about the ongoing “aridification” of the US SW and the ever-dwindling Colorado and Rio Grande Rivers. And the need for the 7 SW states who use the Colorado to cut back and come to terms with how they plan to “share” the water in the future.
Also an interesting article on how farmers in the Hatch area have transitioned to crops other than chiles over the past two decades.Expect to pay more for your Hatch green chiles, mi amigos.
I’ll again suggest a book written by William DeBuys in 2011 that outlined the history of the region WRT climate change/desertification and accurately predicted the future we’re now living.
July 27, 2022 at 12:11 am |
Delightful grass roasting weather up here on the east side of the Cascades right now. We hit 111°F per the weather service station yesterday (Tuesday). I believe that’s about 187°F as would be reported from trump world.
I didn’t do any grass watering, just a little flower and tomato plant watering. Your post got me thinking about the Frost and Schwalen nomograph. Just how efficient is sprinkler watering?
https://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/publication/AE048
I believe I can conclude that if I had watered yesterday with sprinklers, my grass would have remained parched and the moisture I added to the air would have fallen somewhere over the Rockies in about four days. Perhaps that wouldn’t be too bad for you guys sucking on the Rio Grande straw.
I’ll have to check out DeBuys book. I might even have to read Cadillac Desert again.
July 27, 2022 at 5:39 pm |
Hopi Kingoes. We got green on top of green here in the mitten state yet I’m not crowing about it since one false move and we could see a drought the way global warming is progressing. I see your dilemma since you cannot expect to grow shade trees without…..water, yet that is what you need to filter the heat off the house. I know they be ugly/costly and finicky but ever thought of solar panels? I wish they could make them look like Buddhist temples or something that pleases the eye and comforts the soul.
July 28, 2022 at 8:11 pm |
Artificial turf might be an option. We’re considering it for the backyard where grass won’t grow.