The cottonwood looks like it'll be happy for awhile with its roots into the dragonfly pond.
Here's a better look at the soapberry thicket. Happy trees, happy me!
My pumping situation isn't optimal yet. I had plumbed my 2" trash pump to the faucets but don't have the wiring to it done yet. The electrician should come do that in about a week. So I can't pump out the settling pond without that pump. It's sitting in the stucco tank under 12' of water, not wired yet.
I ordered a new one today, which should arrive in a few days. I could use a 2" gas pump but not physically able to get it to the settling pond. I also have a 3" electric trash pump, but I can no longer lift it either. I could use the little pump I had been watering trees with but that would take a really long time, like 2 days or more. Right now it's not critical if I lose some water. It'll give the arroyos a good soaking. When I get back down there I'll use the 3" gas pumps that are installed at the dirt tanks to pump them into the stucco tank. Since the latter won't hold much water at this time, there's no hurry. Rest comes first today.
Usually when I'm in town I rest up before going back to slave away at the oasis. But this past week I went to Post Park everyday and wore myself out there. Then the monsoon came unexpectedly, and I rushed to the oasis. The oasis was the epicenter of the monsoon. Surrounding areas didn't get nearly as much. My road was spared damage.
With monsoons come all kinds of things that have to be taken care of. Plus the power outage messed up my answering machine, a breaker, and other things. Had to rake up debris. All my mulch went away. Had to redo every single hummingbird feeder. That much rain overflows the internal baffles. They get nasty quick. A big job scouring 14 feeders. Not complaining, just explaining why I need to rest for a couple of days.
When I get back down there I'm going to spend time looking for dragonflies, maybe while water is pumping. The stucco tank didn't go down overnight, but since water was on the outside of it, it wasn't a fair test. I'll have to test it again when there's a place for the leakage to go.
Your original blog photo was different compared to the one you have now. The Cottonwoods were huge and lush. What species of Cottonwood did you plant ??? Were they those faster growing cottonless cottonwood that everyone ordered through mail order back in the 1970s or did you actually plant a native Fremont Cottonwood ??? Cottonwoods when healthy have root systems that go down more than 20' looking for water. But if you've not deep watered from the start, then they have become dependent on regular surface water or drip system. Drip irrigation will kill trees and shrubs as they age. Drip irrigation is nothing more than plants on life-support.
ReplyDeleteThose Cottonless Cottonwood hybrids do not do well when older, they are not long lived, but if you want instant tree, they're great.
You're probably right. Good to know. Originally I planted 3 cottonwoods. I lost the two most native (AZ cottonwood, I think) in the drought of 2011. This Eastern Cottonwood survived. It normally does good as long as I have a drip under it, but my drip quit during really hot weather. It makes lots of cotton every spring. I did plant it before my other trees ie. before I got smart about trees. It seemed like a fun tree to have at the time. I'm resigned to losing it, but can't bring myyself to stop watering it. Since it won't be having a drip anymore it's good to know that's not good for it. If it dies, so be it. I'm working toward a more native habitat.
DeleteYup, those hybrids are the Eastern and generally don't do well from the stress of heat and drought. Not sure what your geology is there. How deep is the soil there ??? Is is a Bajada (alluvial fan) or a flood plain ??? I can never tell from the photos if maybe there is some shallow bedrock below fiven all the hills and mountains around. I would have drilled deep deep holes and used regular large sewer plastic pipe to line the hole with gravel at the bottom and just filled the pipe and let it percolate deep underground. Best place to store water and roots will sniff it out, trust me. Especially cottonwood. Another good riparian tree and excellent wildlife tree would have been the Arizona Sycamore (Platanus wrightii). Again root go over 20' deep and tap into subsoil moisture.
DeleteThe soil is alluvial fan deposit. The tree survived the drought of 2011 when I bought water for it. It's fine for now but at some point I need to let it go.
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