Terracing

Weather: It snowed a week ago Thursday.  When I drove into town on Tuesday, it was if it had never happened.  More snow remained in my area, than farther north, but otherwise it was the same as before: gone from areas stripped of vegetation and remaining in shadows of north facing structures and trees.

One can see the house’s shadow in the photograph above, and the area under the large Siberian elm where snow remains.  It is gone from the scraped area, and lingers where natural vegetation has been cut, but not uprooted.  The leaves on the arborvitae, like most in the area, have browned.

Morning temperatures remained below 10 degrees F through Monday, then began to warm on Tuesday.  That happened to be the first day of the year when the sun shone into my eyes in the house in the morning.  In the yard, there was not enough heat to melt the snow.  Instead, the ground melted the cover immediately over it.  It refroze at night, but each day a little more sank into the soil.  Ice became a problem in walk ways.

On Wednesday, one could see the effects of nature’s natural warmth in the area north of my house.  More snow had melted in the dirt bed, than over the lifeless bricks used to terrace it.  Tall plants stuck out that never had been covered.

By Friday, one could see the effects of live matter.  Those taller plants had cleared the snow away from their stems.

After last week’s snow, moisture patterns changed in the Pacific ocean, and no moisture flowed our way.  With limited evaporation and no new water in the air, the moon was particularly bright.

Last snow: 2/3.  Week’s low: 5 degrees F.  Week’s high: 53 degrees F in the shade.  Winds were up to 30 mph in Santa Fé.

What’s green in the area: One-seeded junipers, and most cultivated evergreens; Japanese honeysuckles and all the cultivated yuccas.

What’s green in my yard: Leaves on Cliff rose, large-leaved soapwort, and some bearded iris and sweet peas.  One juniper was fragrant when I got near it Friday.  I have never noticed the smell before.  I do not know if it was emitting more oils into the air, or if the moisture in the winter air amplified it.  Leaves on blue flax are more blue than usual.

What’s turned red in the area: New growth on trees in the rose family, especially apricots, are redder than before.

What’s red in my yard: Some alfilerillo in the gravel driveway has green leaves with red edges; most of the coral bells have green leaves, but one group is more purple.  Some stems on roses are pale green and some are maroon.

What’s gray in my yard: Some new, tiny leaves amongst the dead ones in the clump of snow-in-summer.

Animal sightings: Rabbit tracks.

Tasks: When I walked around the yard on Friday, I found more large Russian thistle carcasses, which I threw back over the fence.  I moved from Siberian elms through purple leafed plums in my annual update of plant records.

Weekly update: Every so often I look at the local real estate listings.  It may sound like I am a compulsive voyeur, but it is the only way one can see what is growing behind houses, on roads that are too narrow to be safe to look, and along the river where no roads go.

One property showed repeated pictures of plowed ground, I suppose, to show how its texture and how it clumped.  It included photographs of strips of grass.  It was only when I read the description that I realized what I was seeing there and elsewhere in the area.  It advertised “one acre of terraced irrigated land” for sale.

Of course, I said to myself, terracing.  Flood irrigation depends of level land, and level means just that.  Even a slight change in elevation alters the way water flows.

I assumed vegetation belts were meant to mark boundaries between properties, which of course they do.  When they are within properties I assumed they created narrow strips for irrigation.  I just did not think about the need to define water lines by elevation, even though I have had to terrace my beds with bricks.

I pass the field in the photograph below, not the one for sale, every time I drive into town, and I know the person created three strips, but only floods one.  What I did not notice until I looked again is that the boundary, this time a short berm, also demarcated differences in elevation.

This picture happened to be taken in January several years ago, and the snow on the north side is the type that is persisting in the area.

Notes on photographs:
1.  Local yard, 6 February 2020.
2.  Garden bed on north side of house, 9 February 2020.
3.  Same garden bed, 11 February 2020.
4.  Local field, 13 January 2012.