Bulbs from Northern Cape, South Africa
Lee Poulsen (Wed, 18 Dec 2019 17:19:09 PST)
This is interesting information, Christiaan, on the drought+rainfall patterns you reported.
One of the results that all the various long-term supercomputer climate models show with increasing CO_2 is that around the world, the overall amount of rain isn’t going to decrease, and in many areas, the total amount of annual rainfall will actually increase. *However*, the computer model outputs indicate that in many areas the rainstorms will produce shorter but more intense rainfall with larger amounts of rainfall over a shorter period of time separated by increasingly longer periods with no rain. So the *total* rainfall will actually be greater. But it will come in huge downpours that will probably cause lots of flooding followed by up to months-long periods of no rain. Hopefully the local flora in those areas can adapt to that. Geophytes seem already more adapted to those kinds of conditions.
Sounds like you already get that kind of behavior.
--Lee Poulsen
Pasadena, California, USA - USDA Zone 10a
Latitude 34°N, Altitude 1150 ft/350 m
On Dec 17, 2019, at 2:35 AM, cvschalkwyk@lantic.net wrote:
Southern Africa is experiencing one of the worst droughts ever. We are
used to droughts, but the scale of this one is massive. Some parts of
the country started to receive some rain, especially towards the eastern
side, while most of the Northern Cape is still very dry. Some scattered
showers did occur, often dumping large amounts of water in a short space
of time over a limited range.
One such shower happened over Upington on December the 5th, my home
town, officially 65 mm (about two and a half inches), although some
residents measured up to 98 mm (about 4 inches), in less than three
hours. (Just for context: 65 mm is more than a third of our annual
rainfall in a good year). With resultant localized flooding. Happiness
for those who did get rain. Sadness for those who missed out.
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