Rain
is a brain eraser, and a drought freezes time. This is what I’ve learned from the weather of ’96.
This dry summer stretched on like an undeserved prison sentence. The days
crawled by as we watched the sky and the Weather Channel for rain as anxiously
as an inmate on death row watches the clock, awaiting that last-minute reprieve
from the warden. The ferns by our spring died and the water stopped flowing.
Thirsty, wild animals — herons, turtles, raccoons, squirrels, and fox —
trampled the mud around the two remaining puddles of concentrated fish chowder
in our creek, a creek we swam in last summer.
At the Wildflower Research Center where I volunteer, the spring season of
scarce and stubby bluebonnets gave way to a crusty summer spent dragging
watering hoses through crunchy pastures in an attempt to keep recent plantings
alive. The snakes at the Center would often hazard an encounter with a human
just to drink from leaks in those hoses. People’s wells went dry. Giant oaks
looked stressed. And I refused to believe the predictions that this drought
would continue another two or five or ten years. I don’t recall hearing anyone
predicting it was coming; why should I listen to those who said it would linger
forever?
I witnessed the flood in ’91 from our house at Lake Travis, and wrote about
the experience for the Chronicle. I went back and read that piece about
rain, rain, rain, and fire ants, and I thought, “Suzy, you whiner.” I will
never complain about rain again, but I decided I should learn something from
this drought and its hardships, something deeper or even more pragmatic than
simply remembering not to take rain for granted. We evidently learned nothing
from the flood. My former neighbors, whose submerged houses were built on land
lower than the spillway on Mansfield Dam, rebuilt and reinhabited their
flood-prone homes. This drought should be different; it should teach us some
unforgettable lessons.
I decided to write about it. The day I started calling other people to find
out what they’d learned from the driest year on record, it started to rain. Our
swimming hole filled up to the brim and the rain gauge read nearly five inches
after 24 hours. After only one wet day, the raindrops diluted my memory, and
the drought suddenly seemed like a nightmare in the distant past — even though
it’s not over.
How will we know when it is over? Is it when all the lakes, aquifers, and
streams are recharged? Is it when we have ground saturation over five feet
deep? Is it when cities who share a water source stop carping at each other? Or
is it when we catch up on our average annual rainfall?
Determining the end is as complex and contentious an issue as the drought
itself. Unlike other natural disasters whose onsets are rapid and whose
destruction is irrefutable, a drought creeps up on you slowly and takes months
to establish itself. Its impacts can linger for years after normal rainfall
resumes. And, also unlike the terrible destruction of a tornado, a hurricane,
an earthquake, or flood, a drought drives people apart rather than brings them
together as they struggle to divide a dwindling resource.
Few people can even agree on the definition of a drought, geographically,
hydrologically, or socially. In Bali, Indonesia, a drought is six consecutive
days without rain. And while there’s little argument that we’re woefully behind
in rainfall, here in Central Texas, the various entities that monitor our
groundwater — conservation districts, utility managers, mayors — have yet to
unanimously acknowledge a drought or even determine what degree of deficit in
our aquifers or surface reservoirs will ever constitute a crisis. City
residents whose taps have never run dry may have little empathy for rural
residents whose wells churn up nothing but stinky mud.
Because of a drought’s nebulous nature, I asked my question loosely: What did
you learn, or are you learning, or do you wish people would learn, from the
drought of ’96?
John Dromgoole, owner of Garden-Ville Nursery and host of Gardening
Naturally on KLBJ-AM:
In all of the years I’ve been gardening, we’ve never had a drought like this
one. At my house, I’ve had an inch and a half of rain since October (excluding
these recent rains). We’ve learned that the well-adapted native plants are the
way to go. They do suffer the stress of the drought like others, but their
recuperative powers are greater.
I hope that people will learn to use the components of the organic technique:
soil building with humus so there’s more moisture retention, mulching
generously with four inches being the minimum, and long, slow, deep waterings
rather than frequent shallow dosing.
I do hope we see the death of the lawn. The St. Augustine lawn is a thing of
the past. We have finally seen the demise of this poorly adapted, insect- and
disease-riddled lawn that has kept the nursery industry in multi-million dollar
brackets. They’re going to lose the sale of Dursban and Diazanon and stuff, but
we’ll certainly have better-adapted lawns now or a new landscape style, the
American landscape.
Ryan Trimble, Mayor of Blanco who gained nationwide attention by simply
acknowledging the severity of the drought and enacting water restrictions on
the town of 3,800 people:
I learned how precious water is and how people take water for granted and that
you can’t predict the future. I also learned that when people are under a great
deal of stress, their true character comes out. I made some people mad; they
didn’t like it that I was open about our problem, about our water crisis, but
so far we’ve managed to pull together as a community and cut our water use in
half by eliminating outdoor watering and conserving indoor use.
We drilled another well a few weeks ago and I think we’re going to be okay,
but what’s really scary is to learn that nobody thought about the chance of
this happening, and that we have no disaster-relief plan to deal with it if it
gets any worse. Without water, this town can’t exist.
Larry Walker, owner of Emerald Point Marina on Lake Travis:
We always knew the lake was going to fluctuate, so when we bought this
property we had a contingency plan, so we can manage it. Do we like managing
it? No, we don’t, but it’s something that comes with the territory of Lake
Travis.
And it’s something people around here accept. I’m from Dallas. We were in the
marina business 15 years up there. I was shocked when I got down to Hudson Bend
where people carry pictures in their billfolds, not of their children, but of
water levels of Lake Travis. Three guys flipped out their wallets and said,
“Oh, here’s the water in ’91. Oh, and here it is in ’84 down to 626.”
There’s a lot of misinformation coming out of the media about the lake being
dangerously low, it’s really scared off a lot of people. Lake traffic is down
50-60%, according to the Travis County Sheriff’s office. But we’ve got plenty
of water out here. I’d love to take the media out in my boat with the depth
gauge and show them where there’s 120 feet of water.
Cindy Carroccio, co-director of the Austin Zoo:
Well, the drought made me think about putting in another well, only much
deeper, putting in rain collection tanks, and shelving the water fowl pond for
another year. (It’s been shelved three years running. That desert exhibit looks
better all the time.) I also scrapped the Salamander Interactive Pool exhibit
and the Shamu Pond because of the drought. SchlitterBarton is on hold, too.
I had a call today from a potential visitor who wanted to know if the zoo was
covered — not shaded, but covered, as in mall. We told her the
biodome got knocked out during a lightning storm and should be back on in two
weeks. Other people would call and want to know if it was hot at the zoo. We’d
ask, “Are you out of state??!!?”
The drought made me most conscious of hay — where would we get it and how
much would it cost and would it be any good. Because of the shortage, we
started getting the goats, sheep and cows used to “Drought Buster.” I think
it’s made up of old newspapers and lawn mower trimmings, but it’s roughage, and
cheaper than hay: pre-drought prices were $3 to $3.95 per bale, delivered and
stacked, and drought prices are $5.95 to $7 per bale, if you can find it.
Marcia Herman, natural areas manager at the Wildflower Research
Center:
I still have faith in native plants. I was amazed to see it green up after the
rains, even the areas I hadn’t watered that looked dead. I know now I was right
not to water them, but I don’t know how much longer I could’ve gone if it
hadn’t rained. But just because we got some rain, I don’t think we should
become complacent. I hope we don’t learn that we never learn.
Marianne Sprinkel, owner of Craftsman Farms, an organic farm on CR 190 in
Dripping Springs:
I know I’ve reflected on the drought a lot. It’s forced us to scale down from
six to eight acres to 20 beds, and to cease our farm stand sales.
The drought has inspired us to make the most of what we do have. Everything is
well taken care of, more so than it would have been without the drought — drip
irrigation, heavy mulch. You literally have to make the most of every plant.
For example, I abandoned the Japanese eggplant area. Then after the rains, I
started looking at them and noticed a few new flowers, some tiny fruits. So I
spent a couple of days working on the bed, trimmed back the old growth.
Now it looks like they might make it. It’s like a secret lesson. Because we
have so little, I was forced to take a second look at the plants and try to
make them produce. Right now, a 20-pound box of eggplant is a 20-pound box of
eggplant.
For me, what this kind of hardship does is teach you a lesson to adjust your
thinking to adapt to your environment. It’s made me very grateful for the years
we’ve had good production.
Curtis Rippy, whose family has run Rippy’s Ranch Supply in Dripping Springs
and raised cattle in the area for generations:
We got some rain, but not in time for a lot of the ranchers who’ve already had
to liquidate their cattle because feed prices went so high. They’re starting to
come down a little now, but I’ve never seen them so high. Back in the Fifties,
when we had our last bad drought, it was a different world. Feed was cheap.
Ranchers could hang onto their cattle. In the ranching business, you got to
learn these things are going to happen.
Quinton Martin, chief water resources planner for the Lower Colorado River
Authority:
What we’re learning is to be more aware of public information needs. We base
our drought management on when the reservoirs were last full, which was June of
1995. So, on January 1 of this year we were 90 percent full, which is no
drought. We define our drought if, at the beginning of the year, we’re less
than two-thirds full. We’re about 64 percent full now, but we don’t know what’s
going to happen between now and the end of the year. If we stay below that
level, we start reducing our supplies in 1997 for our irrigation water users.
In our current drought plan, we don’t have any curtailment of our
municipal/industrial users.
Although we don’t consider this a drought from a water-supply point of view,
we do consider it a drought for people who depend upon rainfall or small,
isolated water-collection systems. They’ve been effected substantially because
it got so dry. We typically don’t have this kind of dry year; it’s comparable
to what we might get every 20 years. And if you go back in the records, back to
the 1850s, we’ve not ever had two really dry years back to back. We doubt if
next year will be as dry as this year’s been.
Paula Di Fonso, General Manager for New Braunfels Utilities:
I’ve learned you have to plan. Once you’re into a drought, there’s no simple,
quick solution to finding alternative water resources. We can’t sit back when
we have plenty and say everything’s okay. It costs money, but we need to make
the investment because once the drought is upon you, it’s very painful, and
you’re not going to come out of it very easily. The way I understand it, the
documentation on it, this drought is even more extreme in its degree than the
drought of the Fifties.
It’s been difficult here in New Braunfels, having planned and having paid for
alternate water supplies, yet still seeing those around — especially San
Antonio, as large as they are –having looked many times at whether or not they
should make plans for the future and didn’t do it, just sat there and said,
“No, we have plenty.” Now we’re in a severe drought. Emotions are high. The
politics are volatile. And we’re having to react rather than plan and move
forward. It’s sad that you have to go through something like this, so difficult
and so painful, to finally make yourself do something.
I hope people will learn we have to adapt to our region, that we have to plan
and invest in water supplies that will assure our future. We’ve had a time of
reckoning. I hope if we do get relief from this drought we don’t step back
again, and say, “It’s okay. We’ve got enough water now. We’ll wait till next
time.”
William Thornton, Mayor of San Antonio, who made headlines this drought
season by opposing efforts to limit overpumping of the Edwards Aquifer:
No comment.
n When I started writing about the drought, in my typical flippant fashion, I
wanted the article to be fun — gallows humor at the least. I tried to prod
witty remarks from the people I talked to, hoping they’d sprinkle their
comments with homespun maxims like “It’s so dry the fish carry canteens,” or
“This drought’s so bad the trees are bribing the dogs.” But oddly enough, no
one could find any humor in dying plants, thirsty animals, rotten well water,
and economic disaster. I think Todd Votteler, special master for the federal
court, appointed by Judge Lucius Bunton III to draft the 1996 Emergency
Withdrawal Reduction Plan for the Edwards Aquifer, summed up everyone’s
feelings when he said, “I wish I could’ve thought of something funny about the
drought, but I couldn’t. Nothing.”
Maybe a drought’s lingering nature enhances this somberness, the impending
threat of Depression Era dust bowls and famine and the collapse of the world we
know. That certainly takes the yuks out of it for me. Or maybe it’s because the
lessons of the droughts are never learned. As Votteler put it, “The primary
lesson I’ve learned from the drought is that it takes years to develop
alternative water supplies. Unfortunately, water supply issues don’t receive
much attention until a drought begins. And as soon as the drought ends, water
supplies are forgotten again. That’s the unfortunate lesson that I’ve learned
about droughts.” n
This article appears in September 6 • 1996 and September 6 • 1996 (Cover).