it is getting close to water rationing here....anyone have water rationed yet?? i can't bear the thought of my yard drying up from 2 days a week watering....what have you done in response to the water rationing?? i told my hubbie last night that i think i would have to give up the gardening......but then again probably not....but i want beautiful and lush....not parched and parched
Anyone here water rationing; how has it changed your garden?
I have planted mostly native and xeriscaped (sp) plants. I have soaker hoses flowing thru and around so I can give them a good soaking without loosing mist to the air. I have water barrels to catch runoff from rain and I use that to water with on the weekends since I'm not allowed to water with the hose then.
You also might want to check out this http://davesgarden.com/forums/f/xeriscaping/all/ forum. They talk quite a lot about how to have pretty stuff on not much water.
my rain barrels
thank you for the link and the advice....great job you have done:)
Sticks, most of us in the Dallas area have been on restricted watering since June 1. Twice a week is what I get, and it isn't so bad. Most other cities are on once a week.
Most of the restrictions exclude hand-watering, so you can still go out and do it manually if you have to. Drip systems and foundation watering are also excluded.
My town has restricted us to Thursdays & Sundays, midnight to midnight, with no watering between 10 a.m. and 8 p.m. If you have an automatic sprinkler system, you can get your whole yard sufficiently watered in that time. If you don't, and I don't, then the best thing to do is set up extra hoses on a timer system. Unless, of course, you like moving hoses and sprinklers at 2 or 4 a.m. :)
Here's what I did. I already had most of my flower and foundation beds on a dripper and mini-sprinkler system that I installed myself. (I really recommend those under any circumstances--they have saved me a HUGE amount of work and water, and probably saved a lot of my pretties. Costs about $100 per system, but well worth it!) Those have drippers on them, so they are okay to run on their normal schedule. But, if they weren't, I would just change the timers to Thursday & Sundays and run it a few more minutes.
Then there's the grass. First I changed all the mini-sprinkler heads so that they watered as much of the perimeter grass as possible--less that I have to cover with a sprinkler. Then I went to Home Depot and bought a four-station timer and extra hoses. On my watering days, I just put the sprinklers out there, and then the timer takes care of the watering during the night. That covers the centers of my yard. Then, during the evenings on my days (8-midnight), I use intensive spot sprinklers for just a few minutes to water the outlying areas. Those have to be operated manually, but that's all the manual watering I have to do. I do that with a rectangular PVC/sprinkler head contraption I made myself, but other small sprinklers work just as well.
The funny thing is... I think I am actually watering my grass more effectively on restrictions. I've measured the output of my sprinklers and put more time and thought into it than I did before.
If my town goes to stage 3, no hose-end sprinklers will be allowed. That's a drag. In that case, I guess I will set up my mini-sprinklers throughout the grass. They'll look ridiculous, but I lost a lot of grass this year due to the 3-year drought, and resodded before restrictions started, and I do NOT want to have to do it again next year.
pb...thanks for all the information; we do have drip and automatic sprinkler systems...i have resisted my hubby doing the rest of the garden with drip, as i have this bond with my water hose(grin)...but i didn't think that restrictions would allow enuf water for my yard....but if you say so then is sounds i will have enuf water....so i at least feel better so that i don't lose my yard...thank you:)
sticks, we'll be going into rationing ourselves here soon in SA. But we'll be down to only Thursday, as far as I know. I'm with renatelynne on the soaker hoses...sprinklers lose alot on the wind...the only problem that I seem to have with soakers tho....is that the soil here is mostly clay and rock, so they have to lay out there quite a bit longer for water to even break thru clay. So I mulch quite a bit. Sad to say, everyone here is suffering thru the brown crispy lawn...but having planted only Texas natives, my rock gardens are thriving. If I'm going to water anything, it goes to my beds! lol...
We've managed to evade restrictions the last two times because the hill country has gotten JUST enough rain over the aquifer to stave it all off. I mean, right in the nick of time, a day at least..!
I'm envious of pbtxlady's system! That is quite an efficient and effective method...
I water with this in mind year long. I only use two days a week and I am very careful to keep everything moist when I can but just make sure they get good root systems and the mulch I can give them of leaves, paper, and what we do buy now and then... then again most of my yard is natives so that I am sure helps too!
When we lived in town with St. Augustine grass I only watered it two days per week. Now we live in the country and go all natural except some plants I hand water :-)