WARM DRY WEATHER AHEAD
Our winter was quite variable with stretches of dry weather and stretches of rain. As we enter spring, this pattern continues. April started off wet but we are in the middle of an unseasonably warm, dry stretch as the forecast is for dry weather through most of the remainder of the month. 

That puts us in a bit of a predicament as you see in the graph below (from our regional weather station data that feeds our weather-based irrigation). It indicates we are currently in a theoretical irrigation need phase this week and into next.  This applies to the most exposed and impacted landscape areas around trees and in parking islands as well as around buildings where soil is not deep. What it means is that dry spots will begin to show up this week.  
So, should we begin to irrigate landscape? During the “shelter in place” and business slowdown, we are working diligently to protect your landscape while providing cost control. Watering earlier than normal is a potential budget buster, thus we will be reaching out to customers to discuss. Rain will return before summer so most landscapes may suffer a little but recover when rains return in May or June. We will need to water new plantings and flowers but will likely leave lawn and established shrub's water off, if you agree. 

A little unnerving to discuss drought conditions in Oregon in April but the U.S. Drought Monitor has most of Oregon in drought condition at this point. Could be a long summer…