The Six Winds of the San Joaquin

The Weeping Mother of the West nourishes the world by mourning its death. She comes in from the Pacific and travels as far as the Sierras, bringing dew and mist to the San Joaquin. She smells mostly of salt and dead fish, with the occasional note of floral sweetness. She has lost her voice, and can speak only in hoarse, dry sighs. On days of rare strength she may bring rain, but her blessing is a mixed one.

This is the only true growing window of the entire year. Plant short-cycle crops and make every drop of moisture count. Preserve anything excess before the Eye arrives.

Chores

• Construct fog nets and dew collectors
• Maintain tools, cisterns, and growing beds
• Farm beans, amaranth, and cactus
• Forage for wild greens and mushrooms
• Breed goats and pigeons

Staples

• Tender greens (purslane, mallow)
• Insects and grubs
• Goat milk and pigeon eggs
• Fog-harvested water

The Scouring Eye of the South is the blistering wind follows in the footsteps of the Weeping Mother. It is portended by the taste of burning garbage on your tongue, by breaths which don't fill your lungs and thoughts which don't finish. When you see smoke on every horizon, it is near. When it arrives the sky will redden with ash and then darken as it falls, and then you will see the second eye of the sun, and everything will burn.

Chores

• Shelter from the daylight
• Trap lizards, rats, and insects
• Ration food and water stores
• Cover gardens with biochar cloth
• Patrol for fire and smoke signs

Staples

• Jerky and smoked meats
• Reptile meat
• Small rodents
• Salt-preserved goods
• Stored water

The Northwest Lash is a gusty wind from the Northwest. It battles the Scour away eventually. Cooler but dry. Gusty, dusty, sometimes rainy. Clears skies briefly but doesn't heal the land. New life can be made from the ash-scars of the Scour and the drizzles of the Lash, but only to those who have mastered the ash.

Chores

• Forage in post-burn regrowth zones
• Sow fast-growing crops if brief rains fall
• Make biochar from ash and worm castings
• Trap scavengers and insects

Staples

• Seeds and fresh sprouts
• Rodents, pigeons
• Wild honey or larvae
• Dried roots and tubers

The Hollow lives in the absence of its kin. It is the breeze which rises from stones and the illusory oasis in the distance. It is where the air is so still and heavy that dust sits above smog in layers like the brackish silt of the San Joaquin. It is the hollow crust of salt around what was once a life.

The air is poison. The wind is gone. Nothing grows. Focus on preservation and sealing against spoil. Let no scent escape. What you save now decides who lives in the Wane.

Chores

• Dry, smoke, and cache all harvests
• Maintain and fill root cellars
• Lay traps for scavengers

Staples

• Salt herbs and pickled greens
• Smoked meat
• Dried roots and tubers

The Waning Walker of the East visits from the east, from the Great Deseret Basin. It is a chilly, desiccating season which strips vegetation, carries dust. The air smells of nothing. The world is colorless.

The soil is dead, but sheltered pots might yield bitter greens. Meat is rare and stringy. Let nothing go to waste.

Chores

• Sow cold-hardy greens
• Trap rabbits and winter scavengers
• Forage for roots and bark
• Mend tools and patch clothing
• Feed animals from stores

Staples

• Cold greens (dandelion, plantain)
• Jackrabbit and pigeon
• Stored flour cakes
• Bone broth

The Southbound Shiver is southbound wind which visits only in those years where waterfowl and susurrations of passerine arrive from the north to greet the Wane. It shrieks and roars across the land, fluctuating wildly and occasionally flinging down sharp rocks of ice from the sky. It's the kind of cold that will break pipes, leave black frost, and occasionally grace the land with a fleeting blanket of snow.

Chores

• Shelter in place, ration tightly
• Trap birds driven south
• Melt hail or ice for water
• Burn scrap for warmth

Staples

• Ice water and snow
• Trapped passerines
• Emergency fat stores
• Cracked root broth