the relentless heat and other news

since september 2016 till date - over 240 days, our area has received exactly ONE day of recordable-level rain and another 2 days of sprinkly drizzles.
during this time, cyclone vardah demolished madras in early dec 2016, jaya amma died, jallikattu protests rocked TN (mostly forgotten now, i think) and more memorable events have transpired.

the failed north-east monsoon of 2016 is already in the record books as the second worst ever in 150 years.

and through may 2017, several parts of tamilnadu have received good summer rains, but a strip of width approx 30-40 kms along the coast from madras to pondicherry has missed out.

through may 2017, we have had at least 15-18 days of very hot (>40 deg C) days.
a scorcher of a month, never before experience by us (in 8 years).
even our well shaded house with high levels of ventilation is barely tolerable.

we had a sub-par agricultural performance in our main season from aug 2016-april 2017. yields remained low for paddy, dals, sesame and abysmal for groundnuts.

through all this tough times, our well has stood strong and we have a good level of water. we are eternally grateful for the previous owners to have picked a great spot and dug such a bounteous well.

as the south-west monsoon has set today (30th may 2017) over coastal kerala, we pray that we get some respite  over the coming month(s).
otherwise, some serious tragedies loom in the neighbourhood.

we have also taken on 4 additional family members, 2 oldish cows (kamala and her daughter haasini) and one female calf (abirami). kamala was scheduled for the meat market, but the kind owner was happy to let us take her away and tend to her till her time comes. haasini still has some mileage left and will go back to the owners in some time. abirami may stay for a bit till she goes through her first delivery.
and lastly sg kittapa aka kittu, a mongrel pup walked in seeking shelter and is currently 3 months old and a tyrant in the making.

one thing that all of us are looking out for - a respite from this relentless heat.

ruin after the rain - part II

it was forecast to be a poor farming season early march.

looking at predictions vs actuals:
Pr: "it is only around 90 days since the rains stopped and already the well levels have dropped alarmingly. the lakes/tanks of the area will barely be able to cover one cropping season (till april end or so)."
Act: tanks dried up early april itself. wells were brought into service and those without that facility had to pay for it.

Pr: "paddy crop seems relatively less affected but due to oversupply offtake prices are likely to be depressed for paddy." as if this was not adequate misery, the farm lease rates and the daily agri labour rates had also gone up by 25-50%.

Act: last year paddy price was Rs 1000-925 (max-min) for 80 kgs. this year it was Rs 900-700. in fact as of today, there are no buyers even for rock bottom rates.
had last year's rates held, the farmer would have made Rs 5000/acre profit (best case - maybe 2% of the farmers) but at the prevailing off take prices now the average farmer would have  made a loss of Rs 5000/acre. a farmer who took a nearby 2.5 acre farm on lease took home a loss of 20k for his work from dec to march! makes us wonder why farmers bother to grow paddy at all.
a high level local trader was lamenting that his stock levels was not moving to the next stage (rice mills) and was likely to make serious losses!!

another statement: "in our 6 years, we have never seen pesticide sprays on groundnut crop (no. 1 cash crop of this area). already farmers (with cash) have resorted to 3 sprayings, and everyone at least 1. and this has barely had any effect."
Act: groundnut prices are better than last year. before you rejoice, the yields have dropped dramatically - by almost 50% on an average. and so is the case with pigeon pea, black gram and green gram. almost certainly entirely attributable to the pest attack.
so again the farmer gets rogered.

wait. some farmers did have it good this season. the watermelon growers. it was not just good, it was a bonanza for them. with scorching heat right from early march and no rain in the season, there was no shortage of demand. prices and yields were good throughout. average profits were almost Rs 1 lac/acre. more about this in another post.

net result: the season has been an unmitigated disaster. taking a crop holiday and earning as agri labour would have been the best option.

Thane super fast!

cyclone thane crossed the coast near pondicherry about 60km from here. we are about 20km from the coast. we had been tracking its movement from monday on imd site and other weather channels and were hoping for some rains for our groundnut crop. what we got was way more than we expected. 20cm of rain and continuous severe gusty winds over 2 days.

we lost a couple of papaya trees, few banana and drumstick trees. we could save some of our papaya trees as we provided support in time against the wind direction. peanut field was flooded and has now drained. we hope there is no lasting damage to the crop. nearby peanut, watermelon, ash gourd crops have got battered. some of the peanut crops had been damaged earlier when as well due to sudden rains 2 weeks ago. the farmers had ploughed and re-sown in the week leading up to thane. its a double blow @ 7k / acre cost each time for someone who barely earns about 20k/acre per year. quite a bad start to the main growing season of the year.

while in the city, any rain anytime is welcome and we would just stay indoors and enjoy hot tea and bajjis. severe cyclone is considered a treat as it brings an extra holiday along with its winds. for the first time we have been amidst farmers sharing their desperation and anxiety over lost money and effort due to crop damage. farming surely is one of the most risky ventures and high risk leading to high return mantra that earns million to investment bankers, does not apply to the farmers. its either normal return or high loss, never high return for the people who produce the single most essential commodity for human existence - food!

there is surely something wrong with the economic order in this world.

season premiere - rains

the rains across tamilnadu finally landed at our doorstep just after midnight, a brief drizzle in the wee hours of April 22 and resumed in a earnest blast in the wee hours of April 23 - a total of 2.5 cms to start the 2011 rain counter.

we should have been overjoyed at this early gift....
but our mud house did not have a roof and we were, in fact, praying for a deferral when we heard news about rains in other parts of TN around April 20.

but the brief drizzle of April 22 had (literally and figuratively) roused us from our sleep and got us to do a minor mid-night roof covering operation.
realising that larger a downpour was imminent, we rushed to do a temporary cover-up of the wall and do a mock installation of the roof just to protect from this rain spell.
and how timely was it....a chorus of collective sighs of relief rendered this part of zamin endathur as the downpour of April 23 morning greeted the village.

this is the pre-roof situation from the last day of construction.

setting up the pipes to hold up the sheets and the tarpaulins.

the final roof mock-up assembly just prior to the downpour.

and it held :-)
and now we are enjoying some seriously wonderful weather and so are the trees and the plants.

wilt, wither and winter

our tomatoes are getting hit.
by bacterial wilt.
there is no treatment...not that we were planning any.
the plants wither away over a week and starting from one branch it moves onto the entire plant.

till date we have lost around 20 plants.
and ouch....many had just started to fruit.


oh...it has hit some of the potatoes too.
from the high of the planting, we are now down to 2 very decent growing beds, 1 average growing bed and 1 almost wiped out bed.


and in spite of the extreme winter reported from many locations across the world including north india, the duration of our winter out here has been severely restricted.
from the time we announced the arrival of winter in early december 2010, we have seen increasingly warm days since mid jan 2011. so just around a month of cool climes.
a majorly curtailed period for vegetable growing. and many organic vegetable growers are getting hit.

looking ahead to a real scorcher of a summer this year.

winter is here

they say that the arrival of mists indicate the end of the monsoon and the onset of winter.
we were totally misted out for 2 hours today morning.

so, except for the rare-depression led rains, we are well and truly into the winter growing season.

enjoy the pics.






the sun is a ghostly galleon...

cleared up - roof intact

the previous post was proved to be "putting foot in mouth"

we have had good sunshine since then and have resumed activity in more than full steam.
have created over 800 sq feet of vegetable beds. more on that in next post.

thanks for the wishes and concerns.

no respite - chappar phad ke

you must have read about our rained in status.

as if we have not had enough, here is the latest weather map - Dec 6th 2010 @0800 hrs


and add the serious cold in the air (today morning was a jaw dropping 14 deg C).
as i type this at 1430 hours, it is still an unbelievable 17 deg C.
(yes, yes...our temp gauge works.)

add the wind chill, it is quite something. (this wind is what is keeping our power situation above water with the solar panels totally packing up for this period).
sweaters, socks, monkey caps are all out and in full use.

we are safe, dry, well stocked and enjoying the darkness and the season in each others' company.

rains and more of same

to say that this year has been bounteous with rain would be like the saying that the 2G scam is a just another corruption story.
especially over the last week of nov, the intensities have just been raised to almost never before seen levels.
the cauvery delta districts have been seriously affected by the rains from 26-28 of Nov.

our own rain data is going through the charts.

Date	Rain (mm)
Prior	619
17/11	60
18-19/11	15
26-27/11	140
29/11	11
1/12	155
4/12	65
Total	1065

especially notable is the 2 hours burst on 1/12 which landed over 150 mm of rain.
the impact is below.

roads flooded (the mud road leading to pR)






house floods and road is cut to let out the flood waters.




and new visitors



yes, we officially retract our earlier dances with joy on the arrival of rain ;-)

sunlight is at a premium, solar charging is hence low and hence online time is low and hence my 'ardent' followers are left perplexed :-)

rainfall data- NE monsoon

the NE monsoon has been in full flow.
here is the rain data since it started. in 3 weeks we have gotten our hearts fill.

Date	Rain (mm)
21/10	50
23/10	57
25/10	15
27/10	57
28/10	21
29/10	55
30/10	6
31/10	61
3/11	60
6-7/11	105
10/11	12
15-16/11	120
Total	619

yes, we have been watching a lot of rain fall.

the NE monsoon is here

and has been one rain-filled week.
we have received nearly 20 cm of rain over the last one week. yes. that is quite awesome because it has been evenly spread out over the week.

the pond is brimming over.




and there are a few deep ditches surrounding the pond and the windmill and they too are a-brimmin' over.



and overflowing out of the property headed towards the little village lake.


and the swales are all pretty pictures awash with water.




here are aerial shots.



and more rain is expected during the week leading upto deepavali.
this weather is beautiful and the temperatures have dropped to sub-20s.

rains continue to bless us

the summer of 2010 has to go down as one of the best rain times for tamilnadu.
the rain data shows that majority of the districts have received much in excess of the normal rain.

last night we reaped the benefit and continue to reap the largesse from this cloud cover.


i used to track the monsoon in mahrashtra religiously, and here is the latest (Aug 2010) district rainfall map.
mah should have nothing to complain. of course, this is assuming that enough water has been stored up in the ponds, lakes, dams, reservoirs, etc.

2010 overall monsoon over india is a considerable improvement from a dismal 2009.
other than a very strong feel-good factor, i think that the above data doesnt matter!!
what say?

magical skies

some breathtaking vistas from the last 2 days.

super rain week and nursey rhyme ban appeal

june 6th to june 12th has been a rollicking weekend.
4 days of fully overcast skies.
3 days of long drizzly spells and 1 heavy spell.
this is the third rain spell this season.
quite a bounty!!
first here and second here.

around 3-4 cm rain in my estimate.
hearing that this is the best june in many years in this region.
we are happy, the plants are beaming, the pond has risen by 2 inches+, the ditches and the swales and the canals have their puddles and are feeding more into the land.
the land has to have soaked up tons of water.
am sure that farmers are all loins girded up for the upcoming july/aug season.

in this context, i appeal to all educators reading this page to ban this nursery rhyme...
'rain, rain, go away.....'

heat is on - again

the last 10 days has been a relentless heat spell.
the weather in chennai is a close approximation of the weather at pR.

inside the pavilion, the heat has reached upto 40 deg C (on May 27) and has hovered in the high 30s otherwise.
10 am to 4 pm is strict indoors time.
the plants are getting their regular share of watering and care.
many are struggling through this phase. we may have lost one cucumber vine and many that we planted post the rains have just not germinated.
a good set of lessons to learn about may heat and growing vegetables.

last time i cribbed on the heat is 3 years ago.

basic element for survival

the rains round the corner forecast turned out to be prophetic. this is our second installment of rains this summer. first installment reports are here and here.
2010 has to be noted down as a lucky summer.

check out the 2 satellite pics of may 18th.

one at 12 noon


one at 12 midnight

all images courtesy - indian meterological dept

we started getting a light drizzle from around 130AM and medium rains from 330AM.
yes, it is the middle of the night and i am noting down the time.

i have been cloud watching since the afternoon of may 17th searching for this rain.
since coming to pR, rains have moved from becoming a thing of beauty/traffic snarler/heat respite to basic element for survival.
being in the cities hardly allows one to appreciate the rains for what they really are.

rain is around the corner

even a simple layman can see this image and come to this conclusion. rains are going to happen pretty soon.

being in the south-eastern part of the indian peninsula has its advantages.
we get a limited but early taste of the monsoon and hence a respite from the sizzling summer heat.

cold freezes northern hemisphere

the comments on the weather from the earlier post today took me around checking world weather - another of my pet muses.

US freezing
UK freezing
China in deep freeze
Korea - record snowfall
Cold wave in North India
Flash floods in Brazil

and of course - the oddest of them all - pleasant weather in chennai.