End of the World. Beginning of a new one. The Life of Amberwolf.

[amberwolf]

They didnt' ever come int eh back yard before the fire, when I had Hachi, Nana, Loki, and Fred (and Bonnie up till a year and a half before that).

But durign the almost-year the house had no dogs, cats new to teh area learned they could come into the yard for safety from other cats that "knew" there were dogs there, and eventually some of those cats learned they could follow them....

Then I came back, with Tiny, but she didn't care about the cats, and never bothered them, so some of them would still come in the yard and stay right up until she walked nearby them, at which point I guess they didnt' wanna risk it.

After Yogi arrived, several months later, the cats found the yard unsafe cuz he has fun chasing them (though he's never come even close to catching one, even when he easily could have kept up and was really close before it saw him), so they dont' come when the dogs are actually out there...but they do come in the yard when they aren't, and sleep in the shaded areas, poop under the trees, etc.

The front yard always had a couple cats that used it for a ltiterbox, but most would not, utnil after the fire, when it became a fenced-in protected area from other cats and some loose dogs in the area. Since then, there's probably a couple of dozen cats (at least) that use it for a potty, but there's nothing Iv'e found to work yet, including any of the solutions people have posted here. Some worked for a short time, but not long-term.

I don't mind the cats, but I wish they wouldn't use my front yard as a litterbox...I really really don't like the smell or the mess. And I can't stop teh dogs from eating the cookies in teh backyard, either, as I rarely find them myself but the dogs are excellent at finding them...and very quick at munching. :/

 

[amberwolf]

The squash seem to be sprouting up and growing pretty well so far. Not sure if the pumpkins are sprouting or not yet, some are too small to tell what they are yet (others have stems over a foot long already, growing sideways mostly).













There's also about six hundred billion little "eucalyptus" tree sprouts from the seeds in the "mulch" from the neighbor, as expected. Most of them are probably not going to get very far, but those that do I may be able to move to the edges of the yard around the fence as "bushes" like I plan to with the mulberry sprouts.




One whole tray of those sprouts has almsot completely died out, though new ones started in some places. Don't know what the new ones are yet, too small to tell, just have baby leaf pair so far.

It's the one that gets the most sun in the afternoon, so I moved it and some others around and put them all more in the shade for that time of day. Seems to dry out less.

After that I got it to dry out even less than that by taking a few of those blue-ice bags saved from the fish shipments and squirting their gel contents into the soil around the sprouts, so they help hold moisture in.

Unfortunately I was interrupted in mixing it into the soil at some point, and came back to find little birds all over it picking the gel bits out, carrying them off. :/ Not all that surprising, but annoying. Not many plants were damaged, but almost all of the unmixed gel was gone.


Spent most of my "spare" time last few days doing yard work (mowing, mostly) until it got too hot, having to continue the next day. Finally finished today, wish I had a couple more days off in a row to sleep it off. :/


washing machine coupler part hasnt' arrived yet, but it shipped middle of last week, eta anywhere from last friday to this coming wed. Hopefully it'll get here Mon or Tue so I can spend Tue installng it and using it. Hand-washing clothes isnt' a lot of fun (especially when my hands go numb randomly doing it and I drop a just-wrung-out item back into the water ), and is extremely time-consuming.

 

[amberwolf]

EDIT: I forgot to note a while back that I started using a garbage disposal grinder I had for pulping the paper waste I get (mostly in the form of junk mail).

I used to just hand shred it and mix it into the dirt I'd plant things in or use to move from place to place "fill" holes or create rises for water flow control (whcih i'm always experimenting with, to see how best to setup various planted areas and trees for ease of watering so it soaks into the stuff that really needs it but flows past stuff that doesn't need a lot (like aloe vera that dies if it stays too wet), etc.

Now in a few minutes I can deal with a couple weeks' worth of paper waste and turn it into a very easily used biodegradable pulp. In fact, if instead of mixing it with dirt later, I just pour it onto a flat surface, I can make a 1/4" thick "paper" board once it dries out (just a few hours in the sun does this thoroughly), that could be used for insulation against heat or noise. Feels a bit like something made of papier mache, but without all the glue and layers, just poured. Sort of like an egg crate cardboard material, I guess.

Presently I have about 15 "gallons" of dried pulp in a container waiting for me to decide what to do with it--plant food or insulation material....

 

[amberwolf]

Washing machine motor coupler came in today, was in the mailbox when I got home tonight.


After feeding Tiny and Yogi, got it installed and tested (thankfully the whole motor/pump/etc is designed around beign really easy to take off to replace this part, so the hardest thing was moving the washer away from teh wall and tilting it against the wall enough to hold it in place to get to the motor but not enogh to fall over). Now I don't have to hand-wash stuff.


The old coupler broke the same way the first one did, several years ago. Let's hope that it takes at least that long before I have to do this again.



It's a bit unfair tonigth with the heat...it dropped down to about 86-87F outside when i got home, but after i opened up the house to air it out (cuz it was about 93F inside) and then the wind picked up, it started to warm up instead of continue to cool, and by the time I was done feeding the dogs it was up to 95F! So now the house is hotter than it started out.

It'll cool off at least some before dawn, but given that it's getting cloudier rather than clearer outside, probably not by much. If the wind dies down, then it wont' cool off inisde teh house much eitehr.

 

[amberwolf]

My youngest sister Kitty is losing her place to stay, so at least until she has somewhere else to go, she's going to stay here, in what used to be my room in the years before the fire (I'm presently in what used to be my mom's, and the fire happened in the room that had been my sister's). It's got it's own bathroom, and was only being used to store boxes and some bike stuff, so it was the easiest to clear out for her use.

It's also at the other end of the house from me so we won't "interfere" with each other much, that way, other than when I have to feed Tiny and Yogi, as Tiny's feedign station is right next to that door (and I don't have anywhere else to put it at present due to size/path constraints, and Tiny being able to see me moving around in the kitchen preparing stuff, so she doesn't get up from her feeding station to see where I am, and risk stuff coming up).


Since she'll need cooling in that room, and the main house AC doesn't work (and would cost too much to run anyway), she brought over a portable AC unit that uses a hose to exhaust it's heat-exchanged air to the outside...but it pulls the air to do that from the cooled air in the room itself, and it's fan never stops doing that even when not cooling, so it has to run more often and longer, as it is pulling non-cooled air from outside the room to replace the exhausted air.

That's wasteful, but also costs more...since I already can't afford even the bills I'm already paying for rent, water, food, and electricity with what I get at work, and am using up what little savings I have to do what I'm doing, she's going to (have to) be paying for the difference in utilities while she's here (and hopefully be able to contribute more than that, which will help us be able to stay here longer--cuz when I can't afford to stay here anymore, then neither can she).



The first problem we face is that Yogi can't resist chasing smaller animals, and she has Mouse, an older kitten. So Mouse will have to stay in that room, and the door will have to stay closed at all times except when we can arrange for Yogi and Tiny to be in my room or outside, or else unpredictable but probably bad things may happen. Tiny probably won't care about Mouse, but Yogi is nearly certain to chase and as he's never caught anything yet I don't know what would happen if he did.


The second problem is that Tiny doesn't like Kitty, for whatever reason, and Yogi follows whatever Tiny does. Maybe Tiny will change as Kitty is here longer, but I don't know, so it means that whenever Kitty needs to be out and about, Tiny will have to be elsewhere--but I'm not going to lock up the dogs, especially when I am not home, because I won't risk them being trapped in the case of a fire or whatever, and especially because Tiny has an extremely unpredictable future (and lifespan) I also won't restrict them from doing what they're used to all that time--even though most of the time in the summer they stay in my room anyway, they do like to go out and play and explore, etc., every hour or two.


We'll have to work out compromises on stuff as we go along.

 

[amberwolf]

Tiny decided to go inside just as the camera finally decided to take it's picture***

and then she came back out but kept moving so the camera coudln't leep up with her then either***


takes stills fine when tehy're laying down, which is why you see so many pics of dogs sleeping...can't get a frickin' picture of them moving. :/

so some of tiny at her feed station, depressed that food is gone down to her tummy already and not in the bowl anymore



and before that tried to entice her with a huge flat piece of ice pried off the bottom of the freezer from the spills off the icecube trays, but she didnt' want it. tried to upload vidoe to yt but site not working for me.



bunch of pics of stuff growing, from the last couple weeks I keep forgetting to upload. Some stuff is already bigger than in these pics. But it takes a lot of water to keep it growing (I coudl reduce the water usage but stuff would just survive, and not grow, and I need it to keep growing for shade and screening).

At the end, the last three pics of of an amaranth plant that I'd pulled out of the ground and tossed aside, but happened to land so it's roots touched the waterline of the "canal" used to water the various things in teh east side yard. It was pulled out several days before this, but one rootlet has managed to grow into the ground engouh to keep geting enough water to let that one living branchlet grow as if it were teh whole plant's focus, while the rest of the plant is withering away.

 

[amberwolf]

A bit back I moved the solar tea-maker and cooker-holder from one shed roof to the other, so it gets more sun later in the day now that sun is shifting in sky again.



Side note, the 3-liter plastic bottles I use for making the tea are getting smaller as the plastic deforms and shrinks from the heat. This one used to have an indented bottom shaped so the top of another would fit inside it, so they'd stack for shipping. Now pressure as the rest of the sides shrank pushed the bottom out....


Even the regular 3-liter ex-soda bottle is a little smaller than it used to be, here seen with tea in it, next to one used for homemade lemonade that doesn't get put in the sun:



We actually got some rain a couple nights ago, whiel I was at work enough to dampen the ground for the night, though no puddles even on the roads, and it was all dry by late morning the next day. :/


No more expected for the foreseeable future forecasts.





.

 

[newbiebiker]

nice pictures of garden area, not shared the picture of Yogi ?

 

[amberwolf]

Dunno what you mean--all the pictures of Yogi are uploaded to ES exactly like everything else is, same resolution. If you can't see them, you may have something in your browser or ISP that is not allowing you to. But there's nothing on ES that would block you.

 

[striider]

Dude- 95 at night!? You gotta get a swamp cooler my brother.... http://tucson.craigslist.org/for/5153363572.html

 

[amberwolf]

At this time of year, evap coolers don't help, they make things worse. While they lower the temperature, they increase humidity so much that it feels pretty much the same.

So I continue to use the regular window AC unit in the bedroom, and it works well enough, though as usual it pulls about a gallon or more of water out of the air every few hours. (between the time I leave for work and the time I come home, and between then and the time I get up to feed the dogs/get ready for work).

There's probalby more than that, but I don't know for sure. There's so much humidity in the air that it freezes up the bottom half of the room-side heat exchanger coil solid with ice during each cooling stage, before it shuts off and lets it melt and drain away. Because there is so much water it wont' all drain out the rear (external) drain, even with a several-degree tilt to the unit. So I have a styrofoam cooler on the dresser under the window, with a towel tucked into the edge of the exchanger condensation pan to wick the water out and hanging down into the cooler to give it a place to go. Then I just dump the cooler out into plants around the outside of the house twice a day.

This is only needed during this "rainy season". (we don't actually get much rain, like last night there was a 3-minute sprinkle, but it was humid all day and night and is still partly cloudy and humid out there now, middle of the day).



Since I'm typically too tired to do much other than work and try to sleep on workdays anyway, especially these days with all the stress at work, the heat at night outside the bedroom isn't much of an issue most of the time; it's cool enough in the bedroom to sleep, and comfortable enough for the dogs who are generaly smart enough to go in there most of the time, and just go out to check noises and smells and whatever out, and just randomly explore sometimes, or go out for potty breaks, and make sure no one is invading their yard.


The landlord will be coming by to fix the main house AC at some point soon, though I still don't have the money to run it. If my sister (moving into the old master bedroom for now) has money then it can be run when she needs it (she'll have her own room-A/C unit).

 

[amberwolf]

Main house A/C is fixed, was just swapped ducts (kinda what I figured, but wasn't sure and didn't matter to me). Fixed by the repair crew of three, two helping one actually doing the work in the very hot attic space.

I reminded them that the fuses are just random ones I found in my junk pile, not even matched, probalby not the right rating, could be too high, or too low, and that they should get some new ones that are actually correct, and I think they just kinda blew me off on that one, saying "well, it's working". Hopefully it won't cause a problem later, like a fire from overheating if the unit fails and the fuse doesn't blow because it's too high a rating.

One of them said they were sure it was running and tested before I moved in, but that's definitely not possible, given the swapped ducts and that it had no fuses. Maybe somebody wired across the fusebox to test that it ran, but nobody bothered to check the actual airflow in the ducts. Another (the one that fixed the ducts today) said he'd advised way back during installation that he thought the ducts were backwards, but was overruled at the time.



Anyway, it's working now, though it's controller has mroe than a 4-5 degree F offset compared to any of the thermometers I have here, so if it is set to 80F, it keeps it at 75-76F or more (and it's readout shows the offset temperature not the correct one). Since all the others I have read within a degree or two fo the same thing, while this is very different, I trust the others.


One thing I REALLY don't like is the deep bass rumble thrumming it makes, which is beginning to give me a headache. I'm going to have to see if there is a way to mount vibration isolators between the unit and it's roof-mounting framework, otherwise I won't be able to run it even if my sister is paying for the power. (I probably can't afford the power cost myself; we'll see how much it takes sometime in the next few days, as the power company's site updates with the daily kWh usage, and I compare to recent days and days from last year, similar months, etc. )

 

[dnmun]

i wonder what phoenix is gonna be like in a decade or so when the temperatures are like the middle east with 120 highs regularly and 100 night time temps and their no longer water to make power at hoover dam and the coal plants have been removed and we finally start running out of super cheap energy.

maybe you can find someone to adopt the cat before your dogs kill it and then you won't have that burden to carry. your sister may have a friend who will love it and care for it.

 

[amberwolf]

No risk of the dogs getting the cat; Mouse stays in her room and doesn't wanna come out, door stays closed to keep us all separate for various reasons.

Tiny is not interested in teh cat, anyway, only Yogi might be (and I think he is only interested in teh chase itself, not a catch).

And my sister would not be able to get rid of the cat any more than I could the dogs, for the same reasons. :/



As for the weather/etc here...yeah, it'll suck more and more each year as things get worse, especially since people aren't willing to live frugally and with their environment. Even I'm more wasteful than I should be, with all these plants that need water, here in a desert, even though I try my best to conserve everything else, and recycle/reuse things. But most people around me that I watch or talk to arent' willing to do even a little bit to slow the progress of bad things down.

 

[amberwolf]

Some really strong gusty but strange winds a few days back. Windmill decoration in the yard was blown over, rusty stakes broken off out of the ground, and the windmill part pulled out of the tower and landed separately some distance away, with vanes bent and pushed into the hard dry ground a fair ways.

View attachment 19




Was odd cuz two plastic trashcans and piles of yard stuff I'd been raking up as time permitted, about a dozen feet away, were totally untouched.


Stuff like this plastic bag were blown into the yard in various places:



Hose box lid on front porch was ripped off and laying beside it, while plastic chair next to it was untouched.

View attachment 13


Dunno what this was from but I found it in the yard a few days later in an area I had not looked in that night, by the southeast gate. It's heavy steel, like the windmill.




Been so hot lately that the plastic suntea containers are melting in the aquarium. This used to hold 3 liters, now it's more like 2.5, if that, cuz it has shrunk so much. The threaded area for the lid has shifted to the left by maybe 1/4" in this picture.




Finally got one of the fish tanks moved up to teh house wall, after shuffling it over a teeny bit at a time for the last year and a half. The bigger one I can't do that with, and it will require 3 or 4 good strong people to lift and move. Probably it will rot where it is before that happens. (hard to believe that once upon a time I moved it by myself...but broke the center divider in the process).




Plants are still growing good, especialy the young mulberry trees--but I screwed up a couple of times and dozed off with water running and my water bill this month is exorbitant. More than twice what it normally is! I can't not water to make up for that, or cut back on anything else (already at bare minimums) so I have to hope that some of what my sister may be able to contribute to the household will cover a little of it.


Pics of some of the growing stuff below.

 

[Chalo]

No risk of the dogs getting the cat; [...]Tiny is not interested in teh cat, anyway, only Yogi might be (and I think he is only interested in teh chase itself, not a catch).

Maybe you could borrow a puma to train your dogs how to get along with cats.

 

[dnmun]

you can build cat run high off the ground too so he can escape. or something to hide under the dogs cannot move.

i think you did pretty good in managing your water. i still use the little pump in the bath tub when i can but now i wish i had put a big switching valve or even just a blocking valve that would allow me to capture the shower runoff and redirect it out into the yard. but i would have to be able to get to the shower drain in the basement bathroom wall and not worth the hassle and i have no yard to speak of.

i did clean up my back yard and rototillered it and planted grass so i now i have a place to sit outside in the yard. except all the mowers and rototiller parts are piled up along the side of the house now and gross out the rich neighbors.

 

[amberwolf]

you can build cat run high off the ground too so he can escape. or something to hide under the dogs cannot move.

That's funny to imagine attempting...you do realize how big and strong even my medium-sized St Bernards are?

 

[amberwolf]

Today I built a gate to keep Tiny and Yogi in the backroom while I am not home, so they will have access to outside either becuse they want it or in the unlikely event of the worst case happening again, but leave the rest of the house accessible to my little sister so she won't have to be "stuck" in her room the whole time I'm away from the house each workday.
View attachment 9

View attachment 7




There are things she needs to be able to do whenever she is able to do them, which may not be often, but may not be able to do them later if she has to wait till I'm home. Or if she needs to go somewhere, etc.


Whenever I'm home they can have the run of the house, unless she lets me know she needs to do stuff, and then they can be in my bedroom with me.

This wouldnt' be possible if the regular house A/C wasnt' running and keeping the whole house (because of the vent configuration) cooled, but as long as she's able to pay for the power needed to do it (I can't) then as long as the dogs are ok with it, we can do things this way.


I started with more of that red 1" square tubing that used to be retail signage, and some old electrical conduit I'd picked up from Freecycle several years ago and meant to build a big flatbed cargo trailer from but never got around to.


I put the tubing together into the snap-togehter 4x4 foot "signholder" and then added 5 vertical conduit tubes in the gate itself; this will definitely keep Yogi from going thru it, but apparently Tiny is determined enough that she can get one leg/shoulder and her head thru. Might be able to get enough thru to get stuck or hurt herself trying, so I will have to add a heavy-duty wire "mesh" across it tomorrow, for the bottom part. Same one I've used as a barrier for them across doors (evne front door) before, just sitting there, and neither one has tried to go thru it; I guess they know they're not supposed to try. Hopefully that will prevent Tiny from trying to do it.


I found a "gate kit" for a few dollars at Goodwill today, and since I have no idea where my existing hinges/latches are, I got it to do this with. I had to wait until I had the gate all mounted to the walls before I could mount the latch, though, cuz I didn't know exactly how itwould line up, because none of the walls are parallel to each other or straight, vertically or horizontally. :/



The hinges I welded to both the hinge post adn the gate, instead of bolting, mostly for strength but also so there are no bolts or nuts between the post and the wall, and it fits better and tighter.




I did know where the caster wheels were, though, so I added one at each end of the gate to support it, so the wall does not have to support any load under normal conditions (even though I have a long screw every few inches thru the hinge-post into the wall's corner stud).





To make them feel more at-home I moved stuff from my bedroom and the front room and hallway (blankets, etc) that they're used to having access to or laying on, to the back room. I also moved Tiny's feeding couch back there, sicne I'd only moved it to the front room because it got too hot for us to be doing it in the back room. Tiny has started using that couch as a "perch" to relax on, sitting up on the arm as if it were feeding time, just chilling out, so I figure it ought to help her relax in the new setup.


I moved Tiny's "marsh sounds" clock/radio/thingy (I think Bigmoose had sent it to me? lost track of who sent what for some things...my apologies to those I mix up ) to the backroom as well. We haven't been using it in recent months but it's familiar to her for when I am not home, as I've been using it since the first day she was with me. Yogi also knows what it is, though he hasn't had quite as long an experience with it as she has.

I'll be moving the HEPA filter fan in there, too, cuz I've used that on high to distract them from "bad" sounds liek thunder, booming "party music" in the area, etc., so they know that is calming, too. I also use it when sleeping, to drown out all the other noises that would otherwise wake me when I'm having troubled sleep. Usually if it's on they chill out and nap,. when we're in the bedroom. So it should also help them in the backroom "new setup".




I've also got one remotely-viewable and controllable camera I will setup in that room in the best place i can find for watching them, so that my sister can see what they're up to and let me know if there is a problem, when I'm at work. (without her having to go actually look at them, which will definitely make Tiny bark, and maybe make them react in ways they wouldn't otherwise be doing, and make it impossible to know if they are behaving normally whenever she's not out there).


Over time, I think Yogi will be chummy and happy enough with her around...though Tiny might never be. We'll have to wait and see. So for now, we do things this way, so that the dogs can't be trapped in the house should a fire or whatever happen, and my sister is also not stuck in her room all the time I'm not home.

 

[dequinox]

I don't know how but you're keeping your yard looking pretty darn nice in some serious heat!

 

[amberwolf]

Way too much money in water is how. about $150/month, which I don't actually really have to spend...but without it, some stuff will die off (lantana around edges of yard) and other stuff like young trees will not grow, only maintain life. If I can get enough stuff growing to shade the yard and house, though, the water expense will make up for itself in coolness/comfort and energy costs. Takes a long time though, both for growth and for offset of costs.


I'd like to setup a dripwatering system, but have not got all the pieces yet, only a little of the small hose and some fo the dripper thingies (I had a kit for a small area but some of it was lost in the reshuffle after the fire). If I had enough of the stuff it would save some water and it would save a lot of time as I wouldn't have to hand water stuff every day.


Dogs are doing ok so far in the back room today (tested out from breakfast time till now; lotsa barking from Tiny whenever they see my sister moving around.

Gotta go to work now.

 

[dnmun]

i bot a 1,500 gallon polyethylene water tank and it is in the back of my house in colorado. if you could find something like that and put it under the downspout and then redirect all of the gutters to that downspout you could catch a lot off water when you guys have these big gully washer rainstorms. i have thought that if i had it here then i could use it to store water runoff from the roof and then pump it up to a storage tank on the upper floor and then use gravity feed to refill the toilet tanks. that is like the biggest water use. showers you can control and keep short. hard to get people to not flush until it has to be flushed. some of us are really old school conservationists from way back. portland hippies were famous for that. they have the water barrel they sell to tourists now from that period.

anyway it is huge so it requires a truck and trailer to move. i am gonna give it to my ex girlfriend and her husband to use at the house in the mountains i built for her back then in 1984. the risk of fire is severe there now that all the ponderosa pine is dead from global heating.

so i was gonna haul it up to her place and leave it there so they will have storage to pump in the event of a grass fire running up to the house. maybe try to find another one or two also to haul up there. but they would cut and run i fear.

i have thought about developing some form of robot to handle firefighting remotely or develop control systems that could respond to the infared. but that would require so much programming and paradigm inputs that may never be met so i still think being able to have remote control and some form of image signal transmission which could be handled by a smart phone or create a line of sight FM system. just thinking. imaging to use to control the robot would be critical.

it could be valuable in certain rural residential situations where people would not stand and fight the fire like some of us who live in the country do. warning to each and every person told to evacuate by public authorities. do not follow their commands. retain control over your life and property. do not let them run you off when you can protect your home from wild fire.

 

[amberwolf]

Haven't seen any tanks like that around here in anybody's scrap piles.


Would be nice to be able to save the runoff water, that pools up out on the street, especially, rather than letting it evaporate. However, right now, it only happens every few months, so there isn't that much use for such a tank.



So far the dogs have adapted to the new situation well enough, AFAICT, though they are extra happpy when I get home and they get the run of the house again.

 

[dnmun]

no, it was not free. i had to pay $150 for it and go pick it up with my trailer. somebody may have shot it full of holes by now too. people with guns like to shoot other peoples stuff up out in the country where i live.

 

[tomjasz]

Way too much money in water is how. about $150/month, which I don't actually really have to spend...but without it, some stuff will die off (lantana around edges of yard) and other stuff like young trees will not grow, only maintain life. If I can get enough stuff growing to shade the yard and house, though, the water expense will make up for itself in coolness/comfort and energy costs. Takes a long time though, both for growth and for offset of costs.


I'd like to setup a dripwatering system, but have not got all the pieces yet, only a little of the small hose and some fo the dripper thingies (I had a kit for a small area but some of it was lost in the reshuffle after the fire). If I had enough of the stuff it would save some water and it would save a lot of time as I wouldn't have to hand water stuff every day.


Dogs are doing ok so far in the back room today (tested out from breakfast time till now; lotsa barking from Tiny whenever they see my sister moving around.

Gotta go to work now.

I designed and installed scores of drip systems. They can reduce water use in the SW by 50%. But people still tend to over water with them since out of sight means out of mind for many gardeners. Many also under water forgetting that drip irrigation is measured in gallons per HOUR not minutes like sprays. Many a desert garden has been ruined by homeowners watering for 3-10 minute cycles when they should have watered for an hour or two.

With your skills you ought to be able to setup simple sensors to shut the clock down when a preset moisture level is reached. The newest irrigation clocks will use satellite data and water using real time ET.

Getting the soil biology pumped up also helps conserve water. There's nothing better for the garden than compost and soil critters. I you don't have a worm bed you should consider processing your vegetable waste with worms and in turn use there casting to feed the plants. 1/2" tubing is pretty cheap but remember every drip manufacturers 1/2 tubing is actually a different metric size and brands of 1/2" connectors aren't compatible. Pick a good manufacturer and stick with it. I'd provide some payback for all the great bike advise and share my pretty vast knowledge of drip design.