[Madame Leota]

After a very wet spring and equally dry summer, my yard is literally baked clay. So glad I'm not doing my regular cemetery with tons of rebar to drive into the ground.
There is absolutely no driving those green stake lights into the ground this year either. I can put lights in the trees but I really prefer a mix of lighting from above and on the ground. Ideas? What do all you dessert dwellers do?

 

[Frankie's Girl]

We've got ground similar to that right now (can't remember the last time it rained and it was a very rainy spring). I am setting up sprinklers tonight and giving it about a half an hour, and will probably do another round or two next week as well. I have done this in the past, and as long as I water a few times in the days leading up to setup, I can get the stakes to go in without too much trouble. As long as there is grass there, the ground will eventually soften up and adsorb the water.

Now if you have nothing but dirt/sand/clay... I have no idea.

 

[TheNextMartha]

You could take coffee cans or something similar and fill them with rocks then put light stake part into it.

 

[Itzpopolotl]

Maybe you could do stragically placed potted plants and stick the flood lights in the pots.

 

[DaveintheGrave]

I always mount some of mine in trees. Either drill a hole in the stake and use a wood screw into the tree or use zip ties or bailing wire.
I think they cover more area when up higher like that.

 

[vinny186]

If you have a drill you could drill into the ground. Use a bit with a slightly smaller diameter than your rebar.

 

[foolishmortal42]

I think the green stakes can be unscrewed from the bottom of the light leaving a round plastic base. You could cut 5 x 5 squares from plywood or other similar sized lumber. Paint it black or green and use wood screws to attach the plastic base to the wood. It sounds more complicated than it is. It is actually quite simple.

 

[Ugly Joe]

I've paved over my entire front yard except for a small stretch of dirt for plants along the sidewalk, so I can commiserate on how to place spotlights.

My solution has been to use plant pots - we have a good number of them around, and they're easy to place wherever I need them.

 

[LairMistress]

I'm no longer a desert dweller, but I did the same as Frankie's Girl. Today, I set the sprinkler out in the front yard, because I had a hard time getting the stakes for the inflatables into the ground. I actually forgot that I had it running, so I kind of over watered today! I'm not doing a lot of rebar, if any, but I will still have stakes behind the stones this year. I put my Gemmy ghost projection light out a little while ago to test where I want it to go, and didn't have trouble getting the stake into the ground.

When I did live in the desert, we had sod laid for our "lawn", so there wasn't too much trouble getting stakes in, because we had to keep it watered. Otherwise, it would be dead in a day.

 

[Ghost of Spookie]

Some of the Gemmy spot lights have a stand with a hole in it where I guess the stake gets screwed on. I used mine last year with the stake but seem to remember the stake comes off. You could always take a thick enough block of wood, paint it black to hide the base at night, and screw the spot light stand onto it using that hole intended for the stake to get screwed into. If you plan the size and thickness of the block, it should do the trick with the fixture and stay where you put it on the ground.

 

[Madame Leota]

Thanks for all the replies! I love the plant pot idea, don't know why I hadn't thought of that before. I also had thought about screwing the light holders to boards and placing them where I need them. I think I'll do some of those today, as well as placing a couple in the tree above. One thing we have to be very careful about this year is not getting those super hot floods too close to the very dead dry grass. This is the first year I can remember not having green grass in October.

 

[Forhekset]

Thanks for all the replies! I love the plant pot idea, don't know why I hadn't thought of that before. I also had thought about screwing the light holders to boards and placing them where I need them. I think I'll do some of those today, as well as placing a couple in the tree above. One thing we have to be very careful about this year is not getting those super hot floods too close to the very dead dry grass. This is the first year I can remember not having green grass in October.

Fellow Texan here so I can relate. My grass is green, but only because I water twice a week and my water bill is double what it is normally...but I hear you on the insanely hot flood lights. I tried CFLs in my stakes (covered with glass jars, to weatherproof them) and they still get super hot, although significantly less than the incandescent floods. I'm going to try some LED bulbs I ordered off of Amazon that should be arriving today.

 

[annamarykahn]

a solution to weatherproof cfl, if you're using work light/brooding reflectors are shower caps ... 2 years ago, we were almost rained out ... rained the whole week b4 halloween :-( ... eventually cleared up about noon on the 31st ... my decorations were put out in between rain storms ... and i used compact fluorescent black lights that i "weather proofed" with shower caps over my reflectors ... worked perfectly and didn't cost hardly anything at all and as far as i could tell, they all kept as cool as normal/usual

for your hard ground, i was also going to suggest watering your yard ... if you don't want to water the whole yard, you can only water those areas where you'll want to drive the rebar into the ground

amk