It rained yesterday in Marana. That’s not earth-shaking news in most areas, but it’s a significant event in the Sonoran desert. Marana averages about 12 inches of rain each year, less than a third of the U.S. average, and the rain typically falls in what desert experts call a “bimodal pattern”–during the blustery summer “monsoon season,” and in gentler winter storms, such as the one we had yesterday. In between, it’s sunny and dry.
Rain in the Sonoran desert doesn’t follow predictable patterns–what weather does?–but the desert weather seems especially capricious. This year’s “monsoon season” apparently deposited a disappointing amount of rain, for example, which is why many locals were grateful for yesterday’s wet weather. The storm yesterday wasn’t a violent gullywasher, like a summer thunderstorm in the Midwest, but rather a steady rain that continued for the entire day, allowing the baked-hard ground to soften and soak up every last inch of precipitation for the benefit of the cactus and other desert plants. By my calculation, in our area we got about three inches of rain while the storm lingered–about one-fourth of the annual average in one day! That will help to make up for any shortfall from the monsoon season.
This is the first time I’ve experienced rain in the desert, and I walked out several times during the day to see if I could spot any elusive desert creatures that appear when it rains–like the spadefoot toad, which emerges from the ground when it hears the drumming of rain on the surface. Alas, I did not see any fauna as I walked under my umbrella, but in the coming days I’m going to pay close attention to the plant life and the mountains so see how the local flora reacts to some welcome gulps of water.
Webner House 