This past weekend, fire smoke has been covering southern Utah and northern Arizona.  There's a forest fire on Pine Valley mountain (http://www.utahforests.org/pinevalley.html).  It's sad.  Instead of rain with the rainy season at this time of year, we now get fires.

California has been getting  fires instead of rain too, for the past 5 or so years.    When the "rainy" season hits, there's plenty of lightening to start the fires..but not as much rain as there should be.   The cause of all this dryness is the worst drought since 1400 years ago.  Imagine that!  It's sad because it's destroying the natural habitat in some areas of California.  And experts say, the habitat has less and less chance of recovering with each season of fires.   In Utah, there are large swaths of forest land that have been burned.  It's becoming a vicious cycle...a scary, vicious cycle.  :(