Greeting from New Mexico

baymule

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What do you cover your greenhouses with? Our area has a lot of wholesale nurserys with rows and rows and rows of greenhouses, they are covered in rolls of plastic. A hail storm would take them out.
 

flowerbug

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@flowerbug, I am just south of the Albuquerque area next to what we in NM call a river. My pastures are watered based on the "river", which can be very scarce. The garden and greenhouses are supplied from a well. The ground water level where I am at is only about 15 feet down due to the location of the river."

being near Alb you may already know this guy's writings in the paper he used to work for but he's now off to academia:

http://www.inkstain.net/fleck/

as in Alb they've been able to raise the water level in the aquifer by using surface water instead of pumping so much from wells the water table has been coming up in recent years. this is a good thing as it means they have some cushion for the drier times that are bound to happen.

the water year looks fairly decent for the SW this season, i sure hope there can be a string of a few more to get the reservoirs built back up.

i find the water infrastructure a facinating topic and have some relatives out that ways so i keep up on how it is going in general and follow some topics in specific (Mono Lake, Owens Lake, The Salton Sea, The Great Salt Lake, storm water, ground water, ...).

have you found it difficult to grow rhubarb there? does it require some shade or does it go dormant in the hottest part of the season?

and i love NM Hatch chilis! :)

i think you are pretty lucky being close to a river (so called or not) and able to use the wells, do you actually have a senior water right? or do you fall under some other regulation for how much ground water/well water you can use? i don't know the regulations in NM at all for that, but i am interested in the topic so forgive me or ignore my questions if they seem too intrusive... i'm currently following the new regulations implementation in CA for ground water and how it is going - that's a big change that has been overdue for 50yrs so they're going to struggle in some areas until they sort it out.
 

Home on the Range

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What do you cover your greenhouses with?
@baymule, our older greenhouses have 2 layers of 6 mill plastic. We use blowers to separate the layers. When we replace the plastic or build a new house, we now use SolaWrap (I am not a dealer or have any stake in the company...), it costs more and you have to use channels to install, but the strength, light, durability and insulation is worth it for us. Plus no more blowers.

i think you are pretty lucky being close to a river
It comes with a price. Most land will run from $25,000 up to $95,000+ per acre. That is just the land cost.

and able to use the wells, do you actually have a senior water right? or do you fall under some other regulation for how much ground water/well water you can use?
Right now I can use my well for all of my needs. The newer water rights are based on the year they were issued. If there is a shortage, then they drop the newest and work their way back. If you have water rights which pre-date 1904 (I think), then you are golden. Water from the river just depends on how much snow fall there was in the mountains plus how much rain fall we get. Where I am at, we get about 12" per year.

have you found it difficult to grow rhubarb there?
I do have to use shade cloth, otherwise it does well!
 

flowerbug

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$95,000 is cheap out here. :p

Mary

a drop in the bucket from what i've heard. oy!

i think $10K-20K for a lot would be fairly normal around here. though on the humorous side i think it quite funny to call "a lot" a little. 200x400ft is a common size here but out in the sticks larger portions can sometimes be found.
 

flowerbug

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@Home on the Range thanks for the answers, gives me an idea of what you're up against there. i hope you have a good season down there with enough monsoon rains to keep some water available. looks like a good year overall so far with respect to water.
 

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