Heat Wave

I had been trying to get away from nursery work for a day, and decided to go to a beautiful area nearby for a day's hiking with the dogs.  It might seem from reading my posts that I spend all my time training my dogs and going to trials, but actually it's very difficult to get away, and I spend most of the daylight hours tending the bulbs, doing computer work associated with the business and shipping orders.

So, yesterday was supposed to be a break.  I left early, and arrived at our destination, a beautiful mountain ridge, at about 8:30am.  It was, at that time 71F, pretty toasty for our area, but not too bad.  The lupines were magnificent, with great swathes in bloom, giving the air a very intense sweet scent that is hard to describe.  We always have to describe scents like other things: citrusy, honey, spicy, etc.  I can't describe their scent at all, it isn't like anything else, so we'll call it lupiney.  You could see for miles, with the Pacific Ocean to the left in the picture with the dogs.  They thoroughly approved of this outing, tearing around, posing for pictures and eating dried cow pies.  Anyway, by 9:30am it was 87F with no breeze.  Hmmm.  87F on this high ridge.  That would translate into worse at sea level.  So much for our day off.

We headed home, getting there at about 11am, and finding the temperature to be 89F outside.  I had left the fans on in the greenhouses, with them swathed in as much Aluminet as I had, and it was around 105F inside.  All my Bomareas were inside the greenhouses, awaiting Mark the magician (who has transformed my property with his construction skills) to return home and build me a Bomarea house.  Bomareas are not very heat tolerant, although there are so many species and from such a wide range that I am sure there are some that would do fine in very hot temperatures.  The ones I have are largely from Ecuador, and are cloud forest plants, so they do well in Humboldt County outside, but are in the greenhouses because it is so windy here.  Last year we had a similar heat wave, and the ends of the shoots were all burned by the heat.  Since the flower buds form on the end of the shoots, I got no seed last year.  I grow my Bomareas in very large pots, about 24" diameter, and about 20" deep, and there are lots of them, plus some in smaller pots, plus all the seedlings.  So for the next three hours I was hauling them all outside in sweltering heat with sweat pouring down even into my eyes.  See how much fun having a plant nursery is?  This morning they look just fine.

By the way, this lovely ridge we were on yesterday is going to host a wind farm.  Right along the ridge they are planning on at least 50 wind turbines, which will destroy the scenic beauty, murder the migrating birds, and pretty much wipe out any local populations of wildflowers.  The call wind power 'environmentally friendly'.  Tell that to the birds.