Severe drought in Spain

Hola Permies!

I'm feeling sad.  I've been away from home for a week (we live on the East Coast of Spain), and I've just looked around the garden.  So much has died in just that one week.

While I was away there were temperatures up to nearly 40°c.  Our village, and the surrounding ones, had severe drought restrictions put in place, and yesterday a fire broke out nearby, (now controlled thankfully) but the helicopters were dipping into our water reserve with their huge buckets to put out the fire.

I'm trying to grow a food forest.  My fruit trees should be getting taller and throwing shade to allow things below to grow in comfort.  I mulch thickly all the time.  I have a rainwater deposit but it's almost empty as we've had no rain.  I've built a kitchen greywater system, but it's also dried out (tomatoes, mint, lavender, curry plant, ginger, all dead or nearly dead) because we're only allowed minimal water use (if there is any water coming out of the tap at all!)

I'm at a loss.  I'm trying to build soil/mulch/succession planting/native plants/drought tolerant plants etc  etc... but when it's this extreme, I really don't know what to do.

Words of support and wisdom would be gratefully received!

Helen

I share your pain...

September 2023



October 2023



Please share my hope!

July 2024

Thank you!!!

That does help!

I'm currently digging deep to find where my resilience is hiding...  that's why this community is awesome, sometimes we need reminding that how it is today, is only a snapshot.  Tomorrow will be different.

I hope you have an abundant day!

Helen

Hey Helen.
We have had 3 years of drought here in the south. This spring it finally rained sufficiently. What a marvelous landscape sprang to life…
I’m crossing my fingers for you guys in the east that this autumn you’ll get some rainfall, I know how much you need it.
Best of luck and best wishes.

Helen, I think we all have wondered how we would make it with long and dry seasons.  I will keep you in my heart and send you good thoughts.

As with many things, One Day At A Time!  You can and will make it to better days!


Peace

Hey Benjamin,

Thank you for that, I really hope it will be our turn soon!  That was a lovely mental image to keep hold of, with the landscape responding to being given water.  I'll hold onto that!

Buena suerte!

Helen

Hi Deane,

That was absolutely why I posted... this already feels easier knowing that there are very many of us permies, facing the same challenges and still keeping going.  I don't feel so alone.  Thank you for your thoughts and hope!

Peace

I am sorry that you lost a lot of plants while you were away.

In the past I have had to be away from home for funerals, weddings, etc.

Ollas can be very helpful to protect you plants so if planing to be gone for a long time use big ollas.

Another trick is to place buckets of water with rope to your plants.  This will wick the water to the plants.

Here is a thread that I did that has several suggestion for how to get water to plants in a drought situation:

https://permies.com/t/138768/Water-Plants-Trees-Drought-Conditions

Hi, Helen.
I'm in Malaga. I won't post pictures of our garden since I don't want to bring you to tears. Even fig trees are falling.

Instead, I will talk about what is thriving with no irrigation at all.

* Carobs.
* Olive trees (but few olives this year)
* Moringa oleifera
* Plecthrantus barbatus (boldo brasilheiro). This one seems to take humidity from the air. It suffers on dry air days.
* Plumbs (prunus domestica). Just one of them, the one with more mulch.
* Vitis vinifera. They had their grapes in early summer.
* Ziziphus jujuba. The one with good mulching is faring better.
* Rhamnus alaternus. Good for under-canopy shade.

We are used to amazing wildflowers here in Central Texas even without much rain, but this year it's been a very late start and many plants did not flower at all, which means some of our beehives are not thriving as they usually do by this time. Our best hives still have plenty left from fall.

Our pond that we have seen get up to 1/4 acre in size will be dry within a week. We are taking this time to get it dredged, re-compacted, and if possible made deeper and narrower to reduce evaporation (the heavy equipment guys will see how deep the bedrock is there which is the limiting factor). The lush growth that surrounds the dryness growing on years-worth of silt - some will remain and some we will use to enrich our gardens higher up. Also, there are is one very interesting plant growing there in the drained but still moist area called Lady's Thumb - it is edible and produces great flowers - so another positive about this experience.

The great thing about permaculture is having redundancy so that sometimes your favorite plants that need more "fill in the blank" won't do well or won't make it, but other things will.

Another thing for us is the dry times sometimes balance out the plants that grow a bit out of control and give us time to reassess and decide what to plant, enhance, or redo.

That thread "How to get water..." is wonderful, thanks for posting that!

Abraham, wonderful list you provided!

Hang in there! The rain will come and you'll be better prepared to hold onto it!

An encouraging story of earth repair and climate adaptation from dry southern Spain - tapping into a global network and working at the community landscape scale toward long term resilience!

Man, that’s tough. You’ve put in so much effort, and now the heat and drought are hitting hard. First off—you’re doing all the right things. Mulching, rainwater collection, greywater systems, planting smart... but when nature throws extremes at you, it’s just brutal.
Here’s some stuff that might help:
- Shade is everything – Since your trees aren’t big enough yet, try temporary shade cloth, fast-growing shrubs, or even placing rocks strategically to keep the ground cooler.
- Make the most of water – If your rainwater reserve is drying up, consider swales, hugelkultur, or buried clay pots (ollas) to keep moisture where your plants need it most.
- Think drought & fire resistance – Maybe swap in hardier Mediterranean plants like carob or cork oak that can handle extreme conditions.
- Tap into local resources – Severe drought restrictions are brutal, but are there community wells, shared reserves, or permaculture groups that could help? Sometimes teamwork is the only way through.
Bottom line? It sucks. But nature is stubborn—and so are you. Some plants might recover, others might need replacing, but every bit of effort builds resilience for the long run. Keep going, adjust, and trust that you’re making a difference on that land

I just read this piece by Bill McKibben on the unprecedented dieoff of insects globally and along with the obvious factors like the hotter and dryer climate, it made a couple of points I hadn't fully considered before:

Insects have a very high surface area to volume ratio, so keeping hydrated in unusually dry or hot conditions is harder for them. Dry and hot together = death.

Climate change is making dry seasons longer, which throws off the emergence timing of insects that burrow or pupate underground (or inside trees, etc.) and means they either have to wait and burn off energy resources they may not have, or risk coming out and finding no food or water sources and failing to reproduce.

So there go our pollinators, predators of baddies, and food sources for uncountable other actors in the ecosystem. All because one species got a little too big for its britches. I'll be getting out and building more insect hotels in coming months, that's for sure.

I did a tour this winter (feb/march) in Spain and people were very happy with all the rain. I am wondering if it's still as bad as last year by now. Did it have a lasting effect? Maybe not so for plants that root close to the surface, but are the trees with deep roots profitting?
Insect hotels attract a lot of insects, but also concentrate the egglaying in one place, it's easy for predators of the mason bees for instance then to lay eggs. When nature was wilder,with lots of stalks and plant debris left in place it was a better environment for insects. Here in France an organisation emerged contracting farmers not to cut the trees they plant in their hedges, 90 different species they offer, miles of insects refuges bringing down insect pressure on crops because they harbor predator insects as well...

Hugo Morvan wrote:I did a tour this winter (feb/march) in Spain and people were very happy with all the rain. I am wondering if it's still as bad as last year by now. Did it have a lasting effect? Maybe not so for plants that root close to the surface, but are the trees with deep roots profitting?
Insect hotels attract a lot of insects, but also concentrate the egglaying in one place, it's easy for predators of the mason bees for instance then to lay eggs. When nature was wilder,with lots of stalks and plant debris left in place it was a better environment for insects. Here in France an organisation emerged contracting farmers not to cut the trees they plant in their hedges, 90 different species they offer, miles of insects refuges bringing down insect pressure on crops because they harbor predator insects as well...

Hi, Hugo.
Dams have recharged a little. So for farmers who use dam water it's still fine.

I got a few crops surviving on the spring rains: lettuce, mustard, favas, but starting June most things have withered. Fruit trees are doing well, as expected, and the same is true for the climbing grapes. The hardy ornamentals weren't so hardy for the most part. Lavender, lentisk, and some brooms are doing well, the others not so much.

At least I could get some mustard grains for trying the sauce recipe...