Someone got the idea that hanging cheap Chinese decorations on syilx trees would make things better.

Maybe they will. Look at how the snow has collected on these dangling balls. Now, consider the farmer around the corner. He’s very up-to-date, with a gate powered by a solar cell, and the works. The cell collects solar energy, which is then put to work. Yay.

Now, look at our Christmas celebrants leftovers again:

Somehow, it was necessary to break this medicine willow, but let’s leave that silliness. Look at that ball, eh! It is hollow, reflects the sun to keep cool, and collects snow. If its top were porous, and it were black, it could absorb that snow and store it as a ball of water, or store it in a sponge for slow release later: much like a solar cell, just for snow and water, that’s all. Not just water, either, because the sun would play a role in melting the snow into this device before it was assimilated back into the air. It happens. We have had, I dunno, 60 cm. of snow this winter, but there’s only 2 cm. on the ground. Much of the rest has vanished back into the sky. With a device like this, we could prevent that. They could then be mechanically harvested for their water, or could each be primed with a quick-growing seed, which could live off their water in the spring. Then it, a nice spinach maybe, could be harvested. We do this with apples. That we don’t do it with water is only a sign of wealth and power. As we exceed the carrying capacity of this land, and as agricultural land is being gentrified, it’s probably time, right now, to start planning for water harvests twenty years out. Here is one thing we could do. Let’s start designing these things.