Thanks for posting that, Dawn, Even though we can all see the conditions, I don't think it can ever be wrong to post a fire hazard warning as a reminder to use extra caution everywhere.

At noon it's now 112 on our porch, and I'm sure it's going to go way up from there. Yesterday it was 114, and today is supposed to be a lot worse. The thermometer only goes up to 120, and I'm beginning to wonder if the needle is going to begin to nudge that mark. I waited until nearly sundown yesterday to try to open the hood of my car to add some oil, but when I got the bottle out of the storage compartment in the back (totally enclosed and shaded) it was too hot to handle!

Be careful, and stay safe.

Pat

I think its apparent that everyday this summer has been a potentially high risk fire day. Until we get rain and green up, its high fire danger everywhere.

High heat stroke risk also.

I check my temps in Austin and then I check OKC to convince my self that really I am chillin'. We have been consistently 6 degrees cooler than you guys and I think I am hot at 106.. Last summer we were 10 degrees hotter than you fairly consistently.This year, You guys might as well be Phoenix. They are cooler at night at least.

Dawn, I very much appreciate you calling these things to my attention. In my mind, it is very much gardening related because news like this directly dictates where my water will or won't be going. It has been a constant juggling act to move water to the area of "greatest need" especially given that the criteria are in a constant state of flux. Yesterday, when you posted I determined I needed to shift the water rotation away from the veggies and over to the side of the house which would be impacted by the fire coming from 134th and Hiwassee. It would have gotten the water today, but instead got it a day early.

Having read your posts for many years, and having gotten to know you personally the last couple, I know you to be a kind and thoughtful person. This post reflects the kindness and thoughtfulness that is at your essence. I appreciate you sharing your knowledge and resources to my benefit. Thank you.

Seedmama

As I drive arround Central Texas I feel like I am driving through Goddards "Weekend" except instead of one car accident after another, I see one black fire scar after another. Some appearing in 24 hour break from passing by. Most are small less than an acre fires, others are a tad more. They don't seem to get reported onto that website. I guess they are so small they don't count if there are no houses close by and maybe the rancher takes care of them or a passing police officer with a fire extinguisher. I know down here, people are now carrying fire extinguishers in their roadside businesses and running out and using them on the roadside. I still am flabbergasted that people are tossing cigarettes.

I totally agree about the folks tossing cigarettes. It's insanity.

Another one that drives me crazy is when someone will pull a car off the road, over any sort of vegetation at all, and never realize that the heat from the underside will ignite the dry stuff. Anything that has a hot muffler (motorcycle, 4-wheeler, and even big mowers and tractors) have the strong potential of starting a fire. The operators seem to think that because they personally aren't glowing hot, that there's no danger. Wrong!!!

Pat

Seedmama,

Your kind words are appreciated. Knowing how close you came to losing your home to a wildfire earlier this year, you know I'm always watching the fire weather and fire maps so I can text or phone you if needed.

It is harder to track fire danger in summer because the winds are lower so the NWS doesn't issue Fire Weather Watches every other day and Red Flag Fire Warnings often like they do when we have windier weather in wind and spring. However, I know from being out at fires these last few weeks, including one pretty close to our place, that the fires are moving almost as quickly now due to all the cured vegetation as they move in winter/spring when being pushed by high winds. That is not wildfire behavior we have observed here often. Usually summer wildfires are sort of slow and lazy compared to winter and early spring wildfires. These year the summer wildfires are raging maniacs.

Too many homes are burning across Oklahoma because of wildfires, and I especially hope that doesn't happen to anyone here.

I've said it before, and I'll say it again. I'd be equally devastated if our house and garden burned in a wildfire, but at least the house is insured and rebuilding would be fairly easily accomplished. The thought of having a wildfire wipe out the garden and take out all the fencing, the wooden boards that edge all the raised beds, the arbors, gates, and trellises, and all the mulch is quite distressing. With the KBDI number being so high, even the humus and compost in the soil would burn and that is distressing too. After 13 years of soil-building, it would be so hard to start over from scratch.

I'm also going to be really mad if the greenhouse burns down before I get a chance to use it!

Wantonamara, I'm glad y'all are cooler this year. No one deserves two of these years back to back. I was really hoping that Tropical Storm Don would bring y'all relief, and then he didn't. Now Emily seems destined to head elsewhere, so I guess we can pin our hopes on the future 'Franklin' whenever and wherever he develops.

What do you mean we aren't cooling off? lol We went all the way down to 83 degrees early this a.m. Isn't that cool? Well, maybe not, but it sure felt cool after the afternoon's 111. We've already hit 112 today, tying my city's all-time record, which was set in August 1956. We are supposed to go to 113 but I won't mind if we don't go any higher than 112.

It is interesting how many fires start along the roadside. While all of the wildfires we've been to this summer have not necessarily started at the side of the road, I'd say 80% of them have. There's so many things that cause it---mechanical malfunctions, carelessness, etc. One of the scariest things we've had lately have been those big old flatbed semi tractor-trailer trucks hauling hay down to Texas. There have been several reports lately of those hay trucks rolling down the highway with flames or smoke coming from the wheels or tires. Our local law enforcement officers rush to find them and stop them before their load of hay ignites. (That has happened before, but not this year as far as I know.) Heaven help anyone whose property has a highway or other heavily-traveled road adjacent to their land.

Pat, Sometimes at fires I (or someone else standing there with me) can smell the grass starting to burn underneath a vehicle (including fire brushtrucks) and have to warn someone to move out of the tall grass. Some fire depts. have lost brush trucks this year while fighting fires because the grass under the trucks has caught fire and then the fire devoured the truck. It is a constant risk. We see it a lot here with tractors and balers too.

FYI: The Governor extended the Governor's Burn Ban to all 77 counties today. I do think our county has had fewer fires since the county burn ban was implemented, and even fewer since the first governor's burn ban was issued, but we'll still have plenty of them.

I was looking at my poor, hot, wilty okra plants today and think they could burst into flames any moment just from all the hot rays of the sunlight they're absorbing. When I walked across the yard to mist the setting hens that are inside the coop, hummingbirds were flying around playing in the mist from the miste, as were cardinals and, a bit more discretly, the doves. I'm glad we have enough flowers in bloom to keep the hummers happy, but think they may find the southern migratation pretty tough this year.

We have planted so many plants specifically for the wild things, but so many of those plants are struggling now and I am woried they won't provide as much food for the wild things as they usually do. The native possumhaws are looking really bad.

Dawn

Dawn, it's interesting that you mentioned the possumhaws. I'd been looking at them as a possibility because I really like their open form. Maybe not right now, huh?

It's wonderful that the wild birds are benefitting from your mist spray. That's just incredible. I imagine you are saving the lives of a lot of them, as well as making them more comfortable and happy. I can't think of any way I could set up a mister, or I'd do it.

I'm glad you agree with me on the vehicle problems. It seems that so many people have no clue as to how extremely hot an exhaust system can really get, or they just don't think about it, unless they have brushed against a tailpipe or muffler with a bare leg. The catalytic converter is infinitely worse. One thing we had a problem with in the west was folks on dirt bikes with improper or inadequate muffler systems that can tend to throw sparks. Lethal things. They'd ride on forestry roads or up in the back country and started a lot of fires with them without thinking.

Pat

I've seen possumhaws struggle with heat a little now and then, but this year is worse than usual. This year is also the combination of the worst drought ever, at least in our county, and the hottest temps ever recorded here day after day after day. Today is our 35th consecutive day at over 100 degrees and about our 40th or 42nd total over 100. So, when you consider that, it is no surprise they are struggling. In previous hot summers and previous droughts, they haven't looked nearly as bad as they look this year. I imagine they'll survive and be just fine, but they just won't win any beauty contests this month.

My favorite mister is a patio mister. It looks like a dripline and you attach it to your deck or porch ceiling or whatever...or the boards used to frame the fenced chicken run for example. You space the misters wherever you want them. Our first couple of years here we had it on the west-facing back porch until we expanded that porch and turned it into a screened-in porch and then, eventually, a glassed-in sunporch.

The mister and a hearty crop of morning glories and moonflower vines kept that west-facing back porch fairly cool until the deciduous trees got tall enough to shade it in summer. Without them, it wouldn't have been usable. We moved here during the hot, dry summer of 1999. The weather that August was very similar to the weather we're having this August so far.

The wild birds are so beautiful and add so much enjoyment to being outdoors, and are great at helping control pest insects too. Their numbers have really dwindled over the last month or two. I don't know where they're going. I hope they've fled for cooler areas, and not that they're dropping dead in the woods.

We're seeing much fewer of the smaller songbirds, but still have lots of doves, crows, ravens, bluejays, cardinals, scissortail flycatchers and a few others, including roadrunners. Also seem to have plenty of hawks and buzzards, though they aren't our particular favorites. Hummers are abundant here, but that may be because we have feeders and tons of blooming vines for them. The roadrunners are not yet coming to our yard to eat birdseed like they normally do in drought, so they must be finding lots of little wild things to eat so far.

I haven't seen any eagles this year, but then we generally see more of them in fall and winter than in spring and summer. There's not shortage of those white cattle egrets that follow around the herds of cattle.

We don't even mow any more without having a water hose hooked up and ready to go. We have a 300' long gravel driveway and when you mow right beside it, it is really easy for a spark to start a grassfire. Been there, done that...but it was little and I stomped it out with my foot. Of course, now there isn't anything tall enough to mow.