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Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 75.djvu/444

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440
THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

Palma china (Yucca australis) in the Village of Cedros. Photo by B. A. Crane.

The heavy rains, sometimes as much as an inch in a few hours, run off with great rapidity through the drainage channels and twenty-four hours later the sides of the mountains and the footslopes appear as if not having known a rain in six months. Here and there in the bottoms of the cañons a pocket in the rock holds a gallon or two of sweet pure water, and out upon the plain pools may linger for a few days on the clay.

Here the summer months are the months of rain, but in most months of the year a little rain may be had. As springtime advances clouds may be seen along the distant slopes and among the peaks with a trailing haze of rain beneath. Though in the summer-time the rain clouds are partial to the highlands, yet more often do they wander out across the plain. Scarce a day of summer passes but showers may be seen falling on some part of the landscape, but the amount falling on any particular area is relatively small.