What a Difference A Rain Makes

The title is a “take off” on an old standard and probably makes little sense to any readers who have not lived in the Southwest desert areas. My experience with rain in northeastern Nevada is that it usually arrives in June, we then see little of it the rest of our short summer--and then it snows.

This years has been different with very cold temperatures in June  (I was bemoaning my non-garden in an earlier post) and little moisture. This post will chronicle the continuing saga of “the” tomato plant. Here it is pre-planting.  

As you may remember, “the” tomato plant started out as a “counter” plant bearing  one tomato about the size of a tennis ball and a  smaller one about the size of a golf ball. The larger tomato ripened and graced a Diehl salad one day. After having surmised that the freezing weather was over (by the end of June) I decided to plant "the" plant outside in hopes the golf-ball tomato would show its muscle and grow into something useful.

Three days later the July heatwave hit Elko and we had 7-10 days of temperatures at 101-105 or high 90’s. I finally checked the baby  fruit and discovered its little insides had totally cooked in the heat. Well, I did say it was a non-garden this year.

Have to admit I neglected the plant after that but then discovered that one branch of it seemed to be thriving.  Hoping I’m not sure what, I dumped a bucket of water on it periodically.

Now comes the irony. We had two rains last week and they could actually be measured. They even classified as rainstorms by Midwestern standards. One friend who lives near the foot of the Ruby Mountains (about 20 miles from Elko) said their rain gauge read 2.2 inches. Elko probably didn’t get that much but some storm drains here in town couldn’t handle the sudden rush of water.

 

At any rate, I checked “the” tomato plant  after the rains. Not only had it thrived on all that heavenly water, it now has 8-10 blossoms on it. (Sorry, they're hard to see because the picture was taken by a somewhat blind photographer, but they ARE there.)  

Poor things don’t realize those freezing temperatures are probably on the way again in 3-4 weeks (while I’m gone and can’t cover the plant). If it does live until I return, I will probably re- pot it and return it to the kitchen counter where it started. That way we may have two tomatoes/month through Christmas (or ten at the same time) and I can feel like I have afforded the plant a true "life cycle."