This year’s drought affecting vegetation and fire conditions

This year’s drought is affecting vegetation and fire conditions.
If you’ve seen a bloom boom, it’s because the wave of warm weather we had early this month.

With the rains and flooding of 2017… To the warm and dryer conditions we’ve seen this year. It’s safe to say we are a little behind on rainfall.

Brian Garcia from the National Weather Service says, “compared to last year this year has been very dry. You know last year we were upwards of 200 plus perfect of normal. This year in the down in the
Salinas, Monterey, Santa Cruz area we are more like 20 to 40 percent of normal.”

And while this is problematic, it has brought some positives in the shape of petals.

Zach McIntyre, KION – “you know how they always say to stop and smell the roses? Well this year you can actually stop and smell the wildflowers. Many residents I spoke to said they are seeing these pop up all over the place.

Garcia says this bloom is due to all the warm weather we have had, “and we had that early because it got so warm in late January early
February… It was really nice. But we’re not done with winter yet, it’s still cold outside. So people have been covering up their plants and trying to protect their harvest.”

And with this year’s lack of rain and early growth in vegetation… Fire threats are heightened compared to the typical rainy season on the Central Coast.

“This weather pattern of going from warm to cold is a classic example of not falling into this false sense of safety that its cold rainy season. To always be prepared for wildfires” says, CAL FIRE’s fire prevention specialist, David Clark.

And though it may seem early to prepare, officials say this is nothing new.

“This is a recurring cycle and we are very prepared for it. And it’s a cyclical cycle that basically repeats itself every year.” – Clark

In other words… This is all part of the circle of life here on the central coast.

“This all ends up being part of the whole pattern in California. We get our dry years… We get our really wet years… And we just have to make sure we make the best of our wet years when we have them. – Garcia