There’s been a bit of exciting weather this last week. And by exciting I mean different from what we usually get during this time of year. Normally it’s hot with clear skies, little to no wind, and humidity around 20%. Hot, dry, clear. Weeks go by with little variation other than if it will be 100 degrees, 105 degrees, 110 degrees, or merely 95 degrees.

Last week we had a couple of thunderstorms pass through! We had actual rain and actual lightning right here. Thunderstorms are pretty unusual in this vicinity. Thunderheads will develop over the mountains 20 miles, or more, to the north, or even further away to the east. Storm cells often form and pass through Temecula, Lake Elsinore, and out near Baker and Needles. They very rarely pass over the Fontana/Rialto/Rancho Cucamonga area. But, this last week we had two days where storms passed right over us, drenching the yard with .07 inches of precipitation. Oh, frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!

Then, we had four or five days of heat with temperatures over 100. Ugh. I’m so done with the heat. It’s hell on the younger plants and I’m forced to water, even when I don’t want to.

My current plan is to water only the youngest plants that were installed this last Fall every other day. Once exception is my Gambel Oak tree. It isn’t a California Native, but rather is from the Utah/Colorado area. It’s drought tolerant once established but it’s used to much more rain than we get normally here. Well, for that matter, my other two oak trees also usually grow in areas that get more rain, too. So, I have been watering the Gambel about three times a week and watering deeply. The Chrysolepis oak and the Wislenzeni oak both are being watered deeply once per week. Lo! And Behold! The Wislenzeni (aka Interior Live Oak) has sprouted new growth of several inches on multiple branches. The Canyon Live Oak (Chrysolepis) also typically gets much more rain but it has not sprouted new growth much recently. It’s sleeping, I guess.

Then, once per week, because it is so hot, I’m spraying the plants down and watering the older plants, too. Well, not the ceanothus plants. They get sprayed but not watered. They hate water, apparently.

The other thing I’m doing is trying to confuse the gophers. I have at least one gopher active in the yard right now. I want to catch him but it has been too hot and I’ve been too tired from work to get in the garden and dig so I can set traps. I think that the gophers are attracted by the water in the soil. So, when I water just the foot or two around a plant, it tells the gopher where the tasty roots are. So, instead, I’m watering much more broadly. The mulch is doing a pretty good job of limiting the weeds so I can water more areas in the yard. This way the soil is wet in a lot of places, not just where the new plants are. It seems to work somewhat. Last year gophers would dig up right where the young plants were, killing them. But, this year I’ve seen gopher mounds where there were no plants at all.

But, I’ve still lost five or six plants to the heat/gophers. Two ceonothus plants are dead and three monkey flowers plus a couple penstemons. I don’t like that. But, maybe that’s just how it goes in a garden. I once counted over 120 plants in my yard, not counting the vegetables in the raised beds. In that case, less than 1% of my plants died. I guess that’s pretty good. I’m still done with all of this heat, though.