Garden Watering Dilemma

If you can collect water at home it's probably a better resource than emptying the nearest reservoir? Although it costs money for a water butt it will help conserve public water stocks. We have three collection points at home, intending to install another. I think using diverters on down pipes is another useful idea. We have a veg plot and a greenhouse, we grow tomatoes etc so it's not easy is it?! 

You have to be around to use the rain water you have saved in butts which is supposed to be better for plants than the chemical treated tap water. That said, I have a computer controlled watering system put in runing off an outside tap, less hassel, especially as it keeps things ticking over when we are away.

peedee

As I originally stated, water butts can't store rainwater if there is no rain regardless of how environmentally aware one is.

Well John your conundrum would have an easy answer if you lived in Devon. Our water bills with SWW are the highest in the country. That water butt would pay for itself in one summer season here. We never water the garden with tap water, like sprinkling money on it. Our water butts are all connected to diverters on the down pipes and can fill up in a week, sometimes a couple of days, but we do get a lot of rain here.

I take your point about overall environmental impact of buying a water butt.  One answer maybe to buy a bigger water butt if you can afford it.  Probably the environmental impact is less on a bigger butt.  Also of course many water butts are made of at least some recycled materials.

We have two 800l tanks.  One just captures from the garage roof but fills easily when it rains.  We emptied one last summer, but not the other.  It is surprising how little extra space they take up.  They are taller but ours have a rectangular footprint so not hugely larger than traditional one.

We also have a Bosch battery driven pump to which a hose is attached and it saves lugging watering cans around.  The pressure is good so I can use the hose at some distance from the butt.

We are on waters here as normal in France and we had severe water restrictions right until 31/12/2022 but now in the clear although a lower are of the Lot south of us still has some restrictions until end of this month, we have water butts around the property like DEBSC in Devon and behind OH's large shed we have a 1000ltr square cuve and a 500ltr that takes the run off from the cuve and I am a bit mean with watering and do not do it every day and have got rid of some plants and will not be putting much in this year unless they are drought resistant so I would get a bigger as Hja suggested. We have this morning with 1 of our water pumps pumped excess water off the top of the small pool cover as it dips with heavy rain and gone into a spare water butt nearby.

We live in one of the driest areas of the UK and have a total of 13 x 210 litre barrels*, all receiving the run-off from various outbuildings.  For the first time in over 20 years, we ran out of stored rainwater in August last year.

We are usually self-sufficient for gardening but have to admit to using mains water (usually overnight on a timer) when we are away on extended trips, often for a couple of months at a time.

When we first moved to our current house, I installed a dripper system to water the hanging baskets, planters and the greenhouse.  Our garden covers about an acre, so there are two different circuits attached to a 4-way manifold plumbed into the outside tap mains supply.  Each circuit is controlled by a Hozelock Cloud Controller which can be programmed to deliver exactly the right amount of water and can be adjusted remotely, via an app.

I know it's a dilemma when trying to balance water consumption against the use of plastic rainwater storage, but I feel a water shortage is a more pressing problem, so collecting rainwater is my priority. 

* acquired over the years via local authority "green" initiatives.

DEBSC,

we've moved to a wet and heavy clay Devon in September last year and at present it is difficult to imagine a water shortage could effect our area. I can easily see how your water butts fill so quickly. At present the rain here is close to Biblical. Our garden is like a bog, but I know things will change and my lovely other half is under strict instructions to keep pots to an absolute minimum. Drought conditions that will inevitably come and pots are a pain in the attention and watering they require. One trailerful is my wife's quota as they can then easily be taken to our sons when we head to the continent for long summer breaks.

We live down a tree lined country lane and the upper part of our garden at about 50m x 10m is blessed with a mature oak and native hedge to one boundary. The other we have planted up with the balance of nearly 300 beech hedge and 4 fruit trees, a Walnut and 3 Willows. The meadow grass will be sown early next year along with wild flowers. The lower garden has 100 beech and 2 multi stem Ghost Birch.

For borders here we are planning more hedging, climbing roses, honeysuckle and wisteria, grown along tensioned wires on the fencing. A 50mm mulch over the planting should help greatly. 

Our aim is is no watering of anything in the ground unless freshly planted, a similar target we set ourselves at our last house in a dry and sandy Formby. With starting from scratch we are obviously at an advantage. 

Colin

Ghost Birches are much like your garden em-beautiful👍🏻. I once took a group pic of quite a few of them on the Bolton Abbey estate, the light level & angle was perfect(Mother Nature not me) it is still one of my all time faves👍🏻

Are you able to divert your household waste water into the butts? By the way when I say "butts" we use all sorts of recycled containers as extra water catchers including old dustbins.

Interesting read on here, I think I will cut back on pot grown plants as time goes on. We've unfortunately lost quite a few in the recent low temps in our area!