It has rained, and rained, and rained today. I thought I would send you some photos to show you why my vegetable beds are raised, my rain garden bed has a trench dug in the middle, and my whole front yard is graded to push the excess water over to the side of the yard. You can see that, if not for the raised beds, my vegetables would be in deep standing water today. They would not survive that environment. On the opposite end of the spectrum, I have a trench dug into my rain garden bed, and I have water loving plants, such as iris and umbrella plant, in that trench where they can make the most of standing water. Finally, knowing how wet our yard is, before construction we graded the entire front yard to slope to one side, forcing much of the runoff water in one direction. We then planted native cedars along that side, where they thrive. So, even though water can be a real problem here, we have found ways to get beyond it, or to use it to our advantage. Sorry the photos are blurry, but the camera wanted to focus on the raindrops that were close, rather than the plants that were beyond the wall of rain.
