Drought is killing my trees or how to store water

[steev]

Here in California, where wildfire season is an annual event, the basic rule is clear flammable stuff NLT 30' away from buildings.

Much of the dry grasses/loose tinder can be combed off with a garden rake; it may be necessary to do a fast scything first, if there is tougher stuff. If you think it's advisable, there's a big pile of mulch, right there. If you water something well, like apples, then lay thick mulch, it will conserve water; just pull away the mulch wherever they need a soaking.

Eventually, when the rains come, you can clear it off to burn or compost, if you're concerned about weed seeds.

Be well.

[ottawagardener]

Other than dead grass, within 30 feet of the house is clear but further up the hill it is doing very poorly. Really hoping for rain to wet things down.

[ilex]

These books are very good: www.harvestingrainwater.com/

[Deleted]

The reason why I liked the above ground cisterns is that gravity might be used to draw the water.

[mountaindweller]

We had a waste water diverter in our old house, I will buy one soon. It costs $25 but your plumbing must be accessible. Swales are great. If you get the money together a water tank is great too. The installation you can do it yourself even I can do it (and that means something). Buy as big as your budget allows and don't try to calculate, because you want to catch all that water.

[MikeH]

Jul 17, 2012 7:26:52 GMT -5 ottawagardener said:

I always mulch as heavily as possible but I don't have a big enough source of mulch

I'm really keen on growing by mulch/compost using a perennial that produces a large amount of biomass that I can scythe. I've been chasing a Canadian source of Miscanthus 'Giganteus'. bluestem.ca is sold out until the spring (their catalogue will be available before the end of the month) but these folks aren't www.bncornamentals.com/catalog/product_info.php?products_id=30. The plants are sterile so they won't show up where you don't want them. Propagation is by root division. I suspect that it takes a couple of years to establish a planting so I think that I'll start a number of rhizomes in a compost soil raised beds in order to produce a steady stream of rhizomes for potting up in the spring and planting out in the fall. Bulking up root mass by growing in a pot for a year is probably a good idea so that they can compete with existing vegetation while getting established.

[ottawagardener]

Yes me too Mike. In our so-called forest garden, right now a transitioning old orchard, I've been putting in comfrey, yarrow and other collectors to slash mulch in situ or near situ at any rate. That along with green manures but they require some rain. It's a great idea to grow a vigorous crop with high biomass for mulch. Wonder how ditch lilies would respond to a once a year 'harvest.'

Miscanthus giganteus is an interesting idea.

[ottawagardener]

Actually, pretty sure a farm down the road grows this in their ditch. I had been musing over how to go and ask them for a slice. Also those other people down the road with their twisted willow for some cuttings...

[MikeH]

Dec 15, 2012 13:02:53 GMT -5 ottawagardener said:

It's a great idea to grow a vigorous crop with high biomass for mulch. Wonder how ditch lilies would respond to a once a year 'harvest.'

I'm also interest in producing compost since I don't have a ready supply of leaves. You need large quantities of biomass for that. I'm not sure that you'd get much compost out of ditch lillies unless you had huge quantities. Then you have to consider the amount of space that you are using. From what I've read, it seems that Miscanthus giganteus produces huge amounts of biomass.

[Hristo]

I'm not sure that Miscanthus giganteus will meet your expectations. Mine is 3 y.o., grown on rich soil and is irrigated. The first year grew to 1-1.2 m, the second year added ~50 cm. and this year again plus ~50 cm., so it reached about 2-2.2 m. in it's 3rd year. As I see you are in zone 4a. This year we had about 8 frost free months. I'm not sure how it will perform for you. Also the stems get quite hard and woody and do not break down that easy. I use them as stakes to mark the rows and they hold whole summer. They are not very thick now. I hope when the plants develop completely the stems will get thicker, so they could be used as support poles for some not so heavy plants.

[ottawagardener]

Hristo: What would you suggest as an alternative? I'm trying winter wheat that I'll kill in situation and other plants. Actually I think a mix would be best so that the microbial community is equally diverse.

[mountaindweller]

Every house should have a rainwater tank. For 20.000 litres it is maybe $2000. You have to allow for a bit of gravel underneath and some pipes. If you want to water with a hose you need a pump too.
Sometimes you can get money from the local or federal government or for the water supplier.
Back in Brisbane our tank was fully paid. Here we got something from the water supplier, but not that much.
We are now digging a swale for the grey water and planting fruit trees into it, will be a very hard work, given our concrete like soil.

[12540dumont]

Consider yourself lucky here a 6000 gallon tank is about $3200. That's for plastic, which I'm not even sure is safe!

[mountaindweller]

I would consider a plastic tank safer than everything what you get out of the tap. They putting huge amounts of chlorine and fluoride and maybe some other chemicals in the water here it tastes disgusting.
Metal tanks are lined with plastic these days.
A friend of ours want to fix an old leaky metal tank with bitumen ( the stuff for the roof) from the outside. He's very aware of chemicals so I guess it would be safe, but I doesn't spend a lot of money on this leaky tank in the end. He rendered old tanks with cement in the past but with mixed results.
In very dry countries water was stored always underground, I wonder how they constructed these tanks.

[raymondo]

My strategies for drought proofing include:

• a 32.5 kL (~8500 gal) rain water tank,
  
• deep woodchip mulch as and when I can afford it,
  
• mid-summer sowings of crops like sorghum, buckwheat, cowpea and so on that are killed by frost and form a mulch layer and leave roots in the ground,
  
• generally avoiding bare ground where possible covering with whatever is to hand.