Hey from an Alaskan Texan

[PingRabbitry]

What rain water?

I’ll have you know we don’t have our rain barrels set up and I shoved a trash lid under the down spout.. that’s right! A whole trash lid full of the rare precious commodity known as rain water

 

[Baymule]

Our DD and family moved to Odessa a YEAR ago, it has rained ONE time. It snowed a little (very little) and they got hail one time. Big whoopee.

I sincerely hope you didn't waste that bountiful trash can lid of rainwater. You could have stood on the street corner and sold it to the highest bidder!

 

[PingRabbitry]

Well, dang! Missed opportunity I did water my new comfrey plant, and soaked the newspapers for the new “shade garden” with it... so I mean.. not a total loss haha we usually get about 35” a year here in Weatherford (according to the interwebs).. so with the gutters I’m hoping for enough to water the garden if we used all our roof space it would have apparently been like 37k gallons or something, but I’m going to settle for 6 barrels, and maybe the occasional trash can lid

 

[CLSranch]

You have to meet Alaskan. He made the opposite transition as you. You can talk about the weather you each wish you were dealing with, depending on the time of year. lol

 

[PingRabbitry]

You have to meet Alaskan. He made the opposite transition as you. You can talk about the weather you each wish you were dealing with, depending on the time of year. lol

haha, well... with Alaska having like 9 months of winter, it’ll be a short exchange on my end haha! Miss the beauty, miss the people, miss the fishing.. not so much the long cold snow filled days

 

[Baymule]

Shade garden? What did'ja do? Put up a tent?

Glad you have a sense of humor. We just had a winter storm a few weeks ago, 10 inches of SNOW and ICE! And it lasted for a week and a half! It got to MINUS SIX degrees! Broke weather records for the last 100 years. I live in TEXAS because I don't want to deal with cold weather like that! Our normal snow comes in, we get maybe 3" and it is melted and gone by day 3. That is my kind of snow, not the Snowmeggedon we got hammered with. It disrupted supply chains at the grocery stores, there are still bare spots on the shelves. Our DD in Odessa was out of power for a day and a half, then rolling blackouts, not a good thing in an all electric house.

I guess you got hit by the same storm, coming from Alaska, you probably wondered what everyone was so excited about. LOL LOL

 

[PingRabbitry]

Shade garden? What did'ja do? Put up a tent?

Glad you have a sense of humor. We just had a winter storm a few weeks ago, 10 inches of SNOW and ICE! And it lasted for a week and a half! It got to MINUS SIX degrees! Broke weather records for the last 100 years. I live in TEXAS because I don't want to deal with cold weather like that! Our normal snow comes in, we get maybe 3" and it is melted and gone by day 3. That is my kind of snow, not the Snowmeggedon we got hammered with. It disrupted supply chains at the grocery stores, there are still bare spots on the shelves. Our DD in Odessa was out of power for a day and a half, then rolling blackouts, not a good thing in an all electric house.

I guess you got hit by the same storm, coming from Alaska, you probably wondered what everyone was so excited about. LOL LOL

Haha, yea.. it sucked. My Facebook is filled with Alaskans, all making fun of Texans because we can’t handle the cold.. but in all honesty.. no one shuts off your power in AK when it’s cold, houses are well insulated, most house have an alternative heat source (wood stove, fireplace etc) and people own lots of long Johns and winter wear.. Texas says “prepare for the cold” so we went and got our electric heater fixed.. if they’d told us they were going to intentionally shut off our power (as they knew they were going to the week before the storm) we would have prepared differently! I think it was pretty poorly handled on their end for sure! But I’m thankful that our blackouts were rolling, and not continuous and I was able to save the peas, onions, radishes, turnips, carrots, and beets I had in the ground!
And as for the “shade Garden” it’s this little corner plot of land that I weeded and organized last year.. then planted broccoli, tomatoes, and peppers with no thought to companion planting or lighting requirements.. it gets about 3-4 hours of dappled sunlight most days, but it’s pretty shaded.. the broccoli and peppers survived just fine but didn’t produce anything until about august and then we had peppers and broccoli until the storm haha. This year I’m going to plant carrots, beets, lettuce, kale, and lots of moderately tolerant shade plants like chamomile and echinacea... hopefully they get enough sun to grow food for us, but if nothing else it’s some good greens for the rabbits!

 

[CLSranch]

moderately tolerant shade plants like chamomile and echinacea...

Please correct me if i'm wrong. I've only picked it out of the ditch witch used to be common around me. I thought Echinacea was a sun loving plant.

 

[PingRabbitry]

Please correct me if i'm wrong. I've only picked it out of the ditch witch used to be common around me. I thought Echinacea was a sun loving plant.

Oh they totally are! Haha but there isn’t enough space in my yard, and they’ll moderately tolerate shade... so into the corner they go!

 

[thistlebloom]

Welcome from north Idaho!
We have good friends in Homer. Well, half are in Homer, the other half is here. He welds on the fishing boats, she holds down the Idaho fort.

I think you couldn't have picked a more dramatic change of climate, but you sound very good natured about it. Best wishes for a good gardening season!