We have had no winter rains here in Tucson, and if it doesn't rain soon, our spring wildflowers will never even sprout. Tucson normally gets about half of its yearly rains in the winter. This could be the driest winter season in centuries.

I would hate to see what it's like here in June after a winter of no rain, but I have horrifying visions of starving hummingbirds, dying plants and raging wildfires. The last rain I had at my house was on October 17, 2005 when I photographed these two ends of a huge rainbow in the partly cloudy sky.

The October rain was from a bit of tropical moisture, and not from one of our winter storms which move in from the northwest. This light rain was unexpected, and it never occurred to me at the time that this could be the last rain we would see for months.