This is the town in northern British Columbia where I grew up, and where my friends, family, and most importantly, my children still live. Dawson Creek, and many of the surrounding towns and agricultural areas have been flooded. Major roads and bridges, vehicles, power poles, and so much
land has just been washed away.
In
Permaculture, we talk a lot about 'drought proofing' our land: storing
water in the soil; digging swales and ponds; building dams; basically anything we can do to get that water there and keep it. But are you ready for flood? Are your ponds, dams and swales set up to deal with an inundation of massive amounts of water? Or will everything just wash away?
I think that it is really important, in these somewhat insane times of freakish weather (among other things), to be prepared for just about anything. Dawson Creek and surrounding area had over 49 forest fires in April. That's just insane. An entire northern town was evacuated because of fire - most of it was destroyed, or affected in one way or another - and now it's flooding, too.
Are you ready for fire? Do you have firebreaks, and the water storage to deal with a major fire? What can we do to be prepared?!
This has really opened my eyes to the possibilities of freakish weather patterns, and the effects they could have on our property, and our island. My mind is ticking through the list of possible natural disasters, and what we can do now, to mitigate the effects they could have on our lives. I'm not one to get all freaky and scared about stuff, but it just seems like it's one thing after another lately, and I am under no delusions that I am immune.
I thought it might be good to start a list of things that can be done, regarding the preparations, structures, and possibly
earthworks, that could help to protect our (that's
ours,
yours, and
everyone's) property,
before the disaster hits. The Man is making cleared areas around the perimeter of our main open areas to use as access as well as firebreaks; between the
trees and us, basically. We're also very careful about fire when it's hot and dry. But there are going to be things that are out of our control, and I want to be as prepared for them as possible. Mentally, as well as physically.
My little brain is just whirling. So many disasters, so little time.
What are your thoughts? Do you have any ideas to share about ways to protect our little slices of paradise, in case of a natural (or unnatural) disaster?