November 11, 2009

After Hurricane Ida

Considering that we are nowhere near the coast, you wouldn't think that the southern Appalachians would be much bothered by hurricanes. But we are. Not the hurricanes per se, but the rain and winds of their remnants. And so it's been with Hurricane Ida.

Really, I have nothing to complain about. We have good drainage around the house and we didn't lose power. Nothing near like what I shared with you in my Re-establishing A Food Storage post. Still, when I looked out of my bedroom window this morning and saw water standing in the field, I figured I'd better go check things out.

Our gift from Ida was 4.3 inches of rain in 24 hours. Plus quite a bit of wind, which blew the plastic out from under the bricks weighting it down on the wood pile, sort of like how a magician pulls a cloth off a table while leaving the table settings in place. And while this isn't what I would regard as flooding, we need to know how the weather effects the land as we plan how to use it.

Next year's garden slopes, and there was some standing water at the lower end.

Most things planted here wouldn't be too happy right about now, so we will either have to attend to the drainage or build the soil up. My biggest concern however, was where we want to plant our fruit trees.

This is the lowest spot, which we realized could puddle water after our last good rain. Fruit and nut trees need good drainage, so we will have to deal with this before they arrive for planting. DH has already dumped one wheelbarrow load of dirt here, you can see a slight mound above. Better drainage would help too.

After taking a look at the fields and garden, I took a walk in the woods. There I discovered that part of my walking trail had turned into a stream. I will have to take measures to make sure this doesn't become a potential erosion spot.

The rain has pretty much passed but the area is still under a flash flood watch and high wind advisory. The flooding part won't effect us here, but the wind is pretty intense as I write. Makes me glad we had those old oak trees trimmed! In fact, our internet seems to be coming and going, so if I'm going to publish this post, I'd better do it now! If you don't hear from me for several days, you'll know what happened.

After Ida photos & text copyright November 2009
by Leigh at http://www.5acresandadream.com/

8 comments:

Flower said...

Four inches of rain is quite a bit! What you need in those low spots are cedar trees! They love it moist..and wet. Cedar trees don't provide food...and there is the problem. They do make lovely wreaths for Christmas.
We are told to brace for the storms that lay off the Pacific coast.

Nina said...

Where we are, cedars are known to be good places to harbour mosquitoes. We've experienced the difference from the cedar trees being there and the yard almost unusable to when they were cut down and we didn't need to put up the screen house!
After a wet and cool summer, a wet and unseasonably cool early autumn, we had two glorious and abnormally warm and sunny days. Now we seem have settled in a few more days of sunshine, although it is cool enough to stoke up the woodstove in the evenings and keep it going for a bit in the morning to take the chill off. It's dropping to near or below freezing at night.

Life Looms Large said...

That's a lot of rain!! Glad it didn't cause any damage, and I hope your power stays on. Being without power isn't fun!

Sue

bspinner said...

Wow, four inches is a lot of rain. I'm happy to see it didn't do any damage. Glad to hear you didn't lose your power. Isn't amazing how lost we are without it?

Renee Nefe said...

well it is good to see this now before you get everything planted. You can take the proper steps to keep it from damaging things. :D

Our weather has been pretty nice lately. can't complain. ;o)

Robin J. said...

Goodness that was a lot of rain. I'm impressed. Maybe there are some fruit trees or bushes that like a lot of water? Glad nothing worse happened with Ida going though.

Leigh said...

Flower, we have quite a few cedar trees, so I'll have to remember to use the boughs for Christmas decorations. Not sure if we'd plant more. I am looking forward to planting those fruit trees. I just want to make sure they can survive.

Nina, I didn't realize they could harbor mosquitoes though. We have one big old one on the south side of the house which has been blocking wind for us for the past two days, fortunately.

Sue, I'm so glad too. I hear several areas lost power. I'm just thankful we weren't one of them.

Barb, you are so right. The main thing I would miss would be the computer! :)

Renee, not that we would have planned it that way, it's just one of those things that turned out to be a blessing in disguise.

Robin, that's definitely something to consider. Of course, we do have a summer dry spell where the conditions would be the opposite!

Sharon said...

I wish we could arrange a rain exchange. We are soooooo dry.