Looks like y’all might get a delivery from Seymour
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Whoa Cat 3 now? Packin’ lots of water for y’all. Even if it fizzles there may be some wetness for ya.
Looks like they are predicting it fizzles and stalls but the outer bands might reach you. Hoping for the kindest gentlest rain for y’all.
We’ve been getting sprinkles … literally. Just 0.02 inches so far.
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Gee. Didn’t realize they could measure that little. 
Just the dew here gives us that much, LOL.
OK maybe just a little less kind and gentle…something to turn all that brown to green and fill y’all’s lakes and reservoirs (rain barrels 
)
I took a walk along the bluffs over the ocean north of town in the pouring rain. It felt wonderful–haven’t experienced a downpour here in quite a while!
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Currently our best chance for rain is from the seasonal storms that spin out of the Alaskan Gulf. About this time of year they start reaching down into northern California and in non-drought years all the way down here by the end of October. However there is still high pressure prevailing at our latitude across the southwest and out over the Pacific ocean. It is keeping the majority of hurricane moisture from edging this far north and the winter moisture from venturing down our way.
They are calling for an inch here Thursday into Friday. It is exactly one of those gulf of Alaska lows spinning southward.This is great news as the last 4 years the RRR has kept the pacific high well north, even in the winter. Our rain today turned out to be a bust. Not a drop, but the North bay area received 4" which is awesome. Many of the states largest reservoirs are located in the North.
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Finally. Down here we’ll probably get a 1/4" from the green radar patch you see near San Diego, hopefully followed by more in a day or two from the system mid-state.
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It sprinkled for 10 minutes in Valley Center – enough to make me think about going back inside. Whatever hit the ground has already evaporated. I’ve got my rain barrels ready though! I won’t let any more escape…
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Let’s suppose your roof is 1000 sq.ft. and it rains a whopping 1 inch. If your capture system is nearly ideal, you’ll obtain about 83 cubic feet of water – which is a single week’s watering for 9 mature semi-dwarf fruit trees. Instead of capturing it in barrels it’s more efficient just to directly route it to the plant(s).
Depending how much acreage you have, the barrels are also missing out on the majority of water that hits your property; i.e., the ground. If you haven’t already, consider enlarging the basins around the trees so they capture all rainfall within their drip line – and lay down sheeting with gravel (or something inert) on top of the other ground so the remaining water is routed somewhere useful.
Just from how little rain it takes to fill my 32 gallon trash can that I put under a gutter of the roof over my small kitchen, I’m pretty sure that math is not right. About 1/8 inch of rain seems to do it. I have to admit, I did no calculating beyond just seeing my container fill up from rather light rains.
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Thank you. 1" over 1000 sq.ft. is 1/12 of 1000 cubic feet; i.e., 83 cubic feet which is 620 gallons – enough for a single watering of 9 fruit trees.
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I have a 3000 sqft barn w/ a tin roof which i use for collection in addition to the house. I could get crazy and divert the 300 ft long driveway water runoff to some kind of storage. Lots of possibilities. I’ll eventually dig a well. The adjacent lot has one. I’m also about 200ft from a creek which runs all year.
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For every inch of rain that falls on a 3000’ roof you get 1500 gallons of water! So 1/2" of rain = 750 gallons , 1/4" = 325 gallons! That’s a lot of water! Wow! Hope you guys get 3"! See this link on where I got my information Innovative Water Technologies - Rainwater volumes from roof runoff | Texas Water Development Board .
1500 gallons of water = one week of watering 9 months out of the year for my orchard.
A normal rain “storm” here is 1/4" to 1/2".
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Richard which trees use the most? I quit growing kiwi I could not keep them in water!
Total annual rainfall in this part of the state is typically 7" to 9" with a few oddball years (4.5", 27"). Further, it typically all comes within a few months so storing rain is a poor economic approach. Instead, capture at the plant or redirection to plants is far more viable.
As for “which trees get the most” – all my trees and plants get the same amount of water proportional to root volume about 9 months out of the year, but for a few months I cut back on water to the deciduous plants but keep watering the evergreens at the same rate.
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I guess your math is right- that’s the benefit of science over simple observation, but 25 gallons should be adequate for a semi-dwarf tree- that’s a pretty good watering in my book- for say, a bearing age peach tree. Now I prepare for your scientific response- it’s more fun than googling “irrigation requirements for commercial peach production in CA” and then having to break down the per acre numbers to per tree. In Israel, I bet they use a lot less water per tree. I’ll search that after you come up with CA.
Just FYI.
… many Western states, including Utah, Washington and Colorado, have long
outlawed individuals from collecting rainwater on their own properties
because, according to officials, that rain belongs to someone else.
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Colorado actually was sued by Kansas for water issues dealing with the Arkansas river and paid a fine KANSAS v. COLORADO. Many states (likely all of our states at one point or another) also seed clouds which may cause rain to fall where they want it to but not necessarily where it was intended to http://cwcb.state.co.us/water-management/water-projects-programs/Pages/WeatherModificationProgram.aspx.