Newsletter 2 February 2017

This is the second newsletter since Summer-Dry was launched two years ago, so those of you who might have been looking for this update expecting news have not missed anything directly, though there have been about 40 plant descriptions posted to the blog.

The initial phase of the site has been a success in simply luring Nora Harlow to write the plant descriptions and getting Dave Fujino of California Center for Urban Horticulture to help us apply for a grant to upgrade the WUCOLS database.

That grant application to California Department of Water Resources (DWR) seeks to add photos and plant descriptions to all of the low and very low water use plants in the WUCOLS database.  Those plants would then be added to Summer-Dry, greatly expanding the initial database created for the East Bay Municipal Utility District (EBMUD) and all photos become accessible per the terms of any State of California grant.

Is the drought in California over ?

California drought map January 31 2016 – Feb 2 2017;

That is the subject of the most recent blog post and  it depends on where you look, but we will always need to garden with water conservation in mind.  The recent post has some excellent links to official drought monitoring sites and links to other news sources.

Going forward, Summer-Dry will be sending out a monthly newsletter, a digest of blog posts, news, and plant descriptions. We now have a mail service that allows this to happen automatically for subscribers.  Sign up at the bottom of the Home Page.

Now that we have a newsletter service look for us to have more information to share, “Like” our Facebook page, and spread the word that gardening is alive and sustainable in summer-dry climates.