It always amazes me what a difference humidity makes. Here in the Phoenix metro area, our humidity starts to go up in July when our "monsoons" hit, and you can really tell the difference. And it is still not that high, but it is much more uncomfortable. Still, I look forward to the rain we get with monsoons. However, they have become more unpredictable than they used to be (or they seem to be). There has been so much (mindless) building on the outskirts of town which has resulted in a heat island. Now, it seems the rains cannot make it into town as it dissipates on the edge of town due to the heat. Someone I know was in San Diego this past week and thought it was almost as uncomfortable as here due to the higher humidity. Amazing, as everyone around here tries to get over to San Diego in the summer to escape our heat.

Diane, I watch the weather really closely now because of my bands and own root plants. I have to determine when they can handle being out in the sun, and when they need to be in the shade. The hot weather and direct sunlight can cause a quick demise for some of these fragile plants. My hubby is just a geek, he has weather related gadgets attached to our home and something in a tree. I do not get involved with any of that, but somehow, information is sent to some gizmo in the house that provides a lot information about the weather. Oh yes, that sounds right, just like July, every year here and there. It was 124 degrees one day in July; a few weeks ago, and any one with an accurate thermometer, or a more localized weather report was aware of the high temperature. After one day of that blistering heat, it dropped down to the normal highs for July in a day; which are the high 100's to 100 teens. July is brutal. But these temperatures are same for the major cities you listed. I was in Palm Desert two years ago during the summer, and it was 118 degrees. I remember saying to my husband when we walked outside " this is awful", then I said oops... we live in Las Vegas.... I had no room to talk. The difference is we were tourists and went out in the heat. During July, in Las Vegas, we go from air conditioned houses, to air conditioned automobiles, and then scurry into air conditioning buildings. The parks are empty during July. This past weekend, there were people in the parks, feeding the ducks and geese, having picnics, playing volleyball. I saw people walking to the neighborhood library and families in the nature discovery park with their young children. It was refreshing to be able to go out. I actually began amending my soil for the Fall blooms:) We average 70 days per year over 100 degrees. Phoenix takes the record for a "major city" with 110+ days over 100 degrees, often hitting the one hundred teens and sometimes above too. These temperatures are not sustained for hours; they represent the height of the heat during the day; and it almost always occurs in July here. But the people who live here now this for sure; we try to stay indoors. I have been living here for 13 years, but visiting Las Vegas here and there since 1976. I am sure there are other records as one would find for all cities, but these records are not the norm. Lynn This post was edited by desertgarden561 on Wed, Aug 28, 13 at 16:24

Susan - Desert heat is certainly not with as high of humidity as say in the south - normally (although Las Vegas is more humid on average than say Phoenix). But when the early and late summer monsoons hit, it can be 100% humidity along with scorcing temperatures in the high teens or higher that would be even worse than the south. Huge volumes of water intake is critical for lepidopterists in these conditions, or anyone else who ventures out into it. Butterflies are like any other living thing in that they can easily die from dehydration. When its really hot and dry, it's not at all uncommon for them to only fly early and late in the day while taking every opportunity to puddle, and hide out in a cooler spot in thick cover during the hottest part of the day. When doing extended field work in those hot weather extremes, I follow their lead and sleep midday. Only chance I get to sleep sometimes in as much as I'm usually blacklighting bugs all night along with doing the leps early and late during the daytime. On a two week trip I usually came back leaving three trails in the sand from the lack of sleep and highly accelerated physical activity. One of those you don't feel it when there is bugs to do, but when you get home you're ready to drop in your tracks. On the other end, midday, mid-summer lep field work in the arctic/alpine environs above treeline can mean wearing layered ski clothes, parka's and gloves just to guard against hypothermia. Ever tried to pick up a fragile larva with insulated gloves or mittens on? LOL I have, a bunch of times. Larry

Rebecca, I think the potatoes would be okay either way. The fact that yours aren't dying back tells me they likely haven't made very many tubers yet, because the tubers would signal a degree of maturity that would cause the plants to die back. Normally. It is just that nothing is normal this year, so I don't know what the heck is going on with your potatoes. I have had potatoes in the ground last into July some years without dying back, and I got tired of waiting for them, had succession crops I wanted to plant and I just went and dug them up anyway and had a fine crop. I do think those also were very hot years, and I remember the potatoes were in the ground and not in the newish raised beds where I grow them now, so it had to be before voles found the front garden. I hope you have a nice time in Fort Worth, and yes, the heat likely will drive you into the pool daily...there's nothing wrong with that either. Amy, I thought you gave fine advice when I read that thread yesterday and really had nothing to add, so I didn't comment. One day there was good rain south of us. I think the very next day there was good rain north of us. Another day it was east of us. I feel like the rain never is going to actually hit us....it just skirts around us all the time. So frustrating. At least for the next 7 days I don't have to get my hopes up because the 7-day QPF shows us getting nothing. Jersey always tore the stuffing out of everything. Now she's down to only tearing it out of stuffed toys she gets in a stocking at Christmas. She had torn the stuffing out of her bed repeatedly and I would unzip the cover, stuff all the stuffing back in, sew up the little holes she pulled stuff through, etc. She had a lumpy dog bed but it was all her fault. Then we bought new dog beds for her and Jet a couple of years ago and she got to sleep on a non-lumpy dog bed again. She liked it. She hasn't torn any of the stuffing out of this new dog bed, so either she finally grew up (she's 11.5 years old now) or she discovered that an intact dog bed was more comfortable than a shredded one. Nancy, I bought a cheap $4 or $5 mini-blind at Wal-Mart the last time I needed new plant labels too because we no longer have mini-blinds in our house. We replaced them with wood blinds with 2" slats several years ago and I guess I finally ran out of all the old ones I saved to cut up for blinds. Or, someday I'll find a pile of old mini-blinds in the garage stashed away in some out of the way spot. Even buying a new blind is a lot cheaper than buying real plastic plant labels in those little packages sold near the seed racks. You get a ton more plant labels for about the same amount of money. Things are frying. The heat is so awful. Sometimes I look at the plants and say to myself 'why do y'all look so bad'. Then I realize they have had above-average heat and below average rainfall for 2 months now, and it all makes sense to me. I probably should be surprised that they don't look worse. There's lot of caterpillars hitting flowering plants hard right now. The ones you're seeing could be the larvae of silvery checkerspot or bordered patch butterflies. Sharon, I'm sorry about your squirrel troubles. It seems like so very many people are having squirrel trouble the last 2 or 3 years. I bet there was a huge squirrel population explosion during the wet years of 2015-1026 and the relatively wet year (for much of OK) of 2017, and now everyone is saddled with those squirrrels, their children and their children's children. I'm not sure what it takes for their population to cycle down again. Out here in the rural areas it cycles up and down because there are predators to help control them. There in town where so many of y'all live, I doubt you have enough predators, except perhaps for people who have an energetic dog out in the yard, so once the squirrel population goes up, I expect it takes it a long time and a couple of consecutive drought years to help the population cycle back down again. I hope you get something edible out of your garden than the squirrels do not steal and devour. I keep looking at our dry cracking ground and wondering why I try to keep the garden green and in bloom. I guess it is because I can. Not just for us, but for all the bees, butterflies, moths, hummingbirds, wild birds, turtles, skinks, frogs, etc. At least as long as the garden is green, all these little creatures and many more have a habitat that is green and producing food for them. There's cardinals in the garden all the time. If I sit still they come pretty close to me. I think they are eating grasshoppers and other pests. There's also hummingbirds all the time. There's many flowers in there for them, plus a hummingbird feeder, and tons of little insects for them to eat. I have greatly upset Mr. Turtle by removing the squash plants. The bumble bees weren't happy either, but there's tons of other flowers in there that they like, including catip and comfrey. Mr. Turtle liked to live under the squash plants and eat squash bugs. Now that I've removed the squash plants, he headed over to the area with southern peas, zinnias and sunflowers, but he comes back every few hours to check the former squash bed for squash bugs. Perhaps he is living in the shade beneath the sunflowers while he searches for other kinds of insects to eat. So, for the sake of all those creatures, I'll keep watering the garden at least once a week for as long as I can keep it alive. Sometimes the early August weather defeats me anyhow. The point where I usually give up and stop watering is when our Keetch Byram Drought Index hits around 600. While the KBDI applies to firefighting, I have tracked it for so long at the same time that I am trying to keep my garden happy in the hot, dry months that I know what it means for my garden when the KBDI hits different points. At 600 and higher, I can keep the garden alive, but it is very hard to keep it producing. At 700, forget the veggie garden....I'd better be watering all the trees and shrubs in the yard, no matter how well-established and old they are. But, when we are in the 600s, it is like the moisture from irrigation can only help the garden up to a certain point and I know that. I do, I do, I do, truly I do. So, often, I will stop watering once it hits 600. Now, this is where it gets complicated.....or it is the point where my brain spaced out and has been out to lunch for the last couple of weeks. Our KBDI was in the 500s and going up about 11 to 13 points daily before the rainfall in early July, and that rain knocked it back down into the upper 300s. So, every time I look at our KBDI number on the map now I sort of rejoice because it still is so much better than it was. Even though I know we got a lot less rain at our house than the mesonet station did and even though I know that our KBDI still would be a lot higher than the Mesonet station's official number for our county, I still feel better seeing that lower number (now back up to 492, I think). I guess I have been spaced out or in denial. Last night after dinner when I sat down to the computer and looked at the KBDI map, I abruptly awakened from whatever coma my brain has been in since the July 1st (or whenever it was) rainfall and realized that the KBDI map still shows color---so if your area of your county is at a different drought stage than your Mesonet station reflects, the color in your part of the county shows that by being the color of whatever KBDI stage your area is in. Where has my brain been? Was it on vacation? Out to lunch? Our part of the county is red, so our KBDI here, even if not defined by numbers, is in the 600-700 range. Well, crap, crap, crap. That explains why the zinnias wilt daily, even though there is some moisture in their soil. It explains why the pepper plants look like crap 24/7 even though they also aren't bone dry. It explains so much....the huge and sudden explosion in the population of spider mites (their reproductive cycle speeds up when it is hot and dry, and they become a huge problem on drought-stressed plants). It even explains why the watermelons look great---they love it hot and dry! Even though my garden gets watered and looks green compared to the rest of the surrounding area, it still is heat-stressed, drought-stressed and in an area with a KBDI above 600. I know that this means----it means I should just give up and stop watering. Let it go. Let the annuals die. Let the perennials get right to the edge of death, and then water them just enough to pull them back into the land of the living. I don't know what I am going to do. (sigh) I even told Tim that we are in the higher KBDI category and that I am not going to accomplish much with the irrigation except just sort of keep the plants barely hanging on. I don't want to stop watering. I don't. Even though I know it would be the sensible thing to do. A couple of times this week, the chairman of our county fire board has sent out communications about fires and how this year's second fire season is about to begin or perhaps already is underway. I tried to ignore their content, tried to push it out of my mind, tried to tell myself that things aren't that bad yet. Well, after looking at the KBDI map, I guess things are that bad, and it shows in my poor hot, tired, dry garden.....that isn't really dry because I water it well, but it is too dry, if you know what I mean. On the bright side, I don't have to blame myself or the plants for how bad they look. They look bad because the conditions are bad, not because I am not doing my best to give them water, mulch and weeding. (At least with fewer weeds, there's less competition for the moisture I give them.) I don't want to pull the trigger and stop watering. I want all the wee little wildlife to have a green sanctuary from the heat. So, I'll keep watering for another week or two. I'll shade the plants I can with shadecloth. I'll add more mulch to try to keep the ground cooler and more moist. And, I'll hope all those efforts aren't for naught. I keep telling myself we're midway through the summer months now. I've kept the garden going this far, and I can get it all the way through to autumn if I try, but even though I say those words to myself, I'm not even sure I believe them. I just hate this weather. Fun stuff is still happening. I've been seeing a doe with two fawns at the compost pile and adjacent deer feeding area every evening around 5 pm, so I put out sliced summer squash and zucchini for them along with some deer corn. The fawns are super tiny and so cute. It is like watching little puppies frolic, play and eat. Well, this morning she brought 3 tiny fawns. I thought she had twins because she's been bringing only 2. I doubt she had triplets because why would she have been bringing only 2 to eat? Maybe she is bringing another doe's fawn, or maybe she has picked up an orphan and is raising it with her two. Either way, seeing three tiny fawns eating is the best part of the day. This morning I gave them thinly sliced watermelon. It was like watching human children have watermelon---they were so delighted! That made me so happy. Dawn