We explore some common water saving tips to see which ones really work.
Do you have to trick to saving water? Share it below.
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Just one.
We only have tank water. One big tank 43,000l. Some places and homes I know might use that in a month from the mains.
I dip the tank often, calculate our usage and share the wisdom of how long before the tank will be empty. It helps to keep me focused and everyone else interested in not wasting what we have.
120cm remaining, we use 6,000l pm including some hand watering of plants. Enough for 12 weeks more. Itās already a 100 year record dry spell for us.
Other rules,
Never water the grass.
Never buy exotic garden plants that need watering.
Plant your favourite small plants in pots, where water and growth can be managed.
Only wash the car when it rains, or at a friends place.
Use a broom and brush to clean the mower and tractor down.
Always keep a reserve for fires. (Separate 6500l tank for that).
Optionally, some suggest no tea or coffee, only drink beer.
P.S.
Iāve tried to spend as little time in the nursery unless itās the cactus section.
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Rather than brick in a cistern (which could damage or break the cisten if mishandled or dropped), most cisterns have adjustment for the float valve. One can adjust the float such that less water fills the cistern, reducing the amount of water used for each flush.
And the Guardianāsā Use greywater to feed your plantsāā¦as most soaps, washing liquids and detergents are based on sodium compounds, it is very important to counteract the addition of this sodium with addittion of gypsum. If gypsum is not used, it can impact on the physical properties of the soil and soil microbial life.
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In Brazil theyāve been encouraging people to wee in the shower. You can also shower with your partner to save water, but probably best not to do both at once.
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We are on tanks here, rainwater collected from the house and the smaller shed roof, so have to manage our water carefully, especially in times like the past 2 record dry years.
We donāt waste any water flushing the toilet, as we have a Clivus Multrum composting toilet. Taking perfectly good drinking water and adding poo to it is such a waste of a valuable resource IMO, yet that is what almost everyone does.
Lately weāve only been showering a couple of times a week, I can usually manage to keep it under 2 minutes, which uses about 10 litres of water, the rest of the time itās a cloth wash from the basin.
The biggest user of water is keeping the plants alive in my wifeās nursery (she does landscaping and gardening), but that work has almost completely stopped due to the water restrictions in town- no watering of gardens allowed, so no one wants to buy plants. Sheās taking most of them to her mumās place on the Hunter coast, where they have had plenty of rain, as we just donāt have enough water, and have already lost quite a few. My aquaponics systems are the next biggest users of water- almost entirely due to transpiration from plants, which can be significant in hot windy weather. Unlike growing plants in the ground, the water is contained and isnāt lost to the surrounding ground or to evaporation. Iāve figured out that for an equal area of vegetable growing the aquaponics only uses about 1/10 the water. Fortunately, the trout donāt drink much 
For plants in the ground, we only water minimally, so have lost quite a few, and dozens of the trees I planted in the 1990s have died in the last 2 years, along with many of the naturally growing trees, some over 100 years old and looking good until 2017.
Weāve only had 7mm in the past 2 months, and none at all for the past month, so in the past week Iāve obtained a few thousand litres from our neighbours bore for household use, it actually tastes reasonable- much better than town water, but not as good as our rainwater.
Iāve also organised for a 13000l delivery of town water, so we have some water in case of bushfire, as weāve had to deplete our normal 20000 litre fire fighting water reserve this year for household use.
Even when rainfall is more normal, we donāt waste it watering grass, so how green it is around the house depends on whether thereās been any recent rain. We have a lawnmower, but havenāt used it for a couple of years!
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On the composting toilets I very heartily agree, the wastage is abhorrent to me, buckets where possible are used in our house of waste water, to flush.
We are told to cut back on watering lawns etc to reduce water usage but they stil insist on systems that use perfectly good water to get rid of stuff that could use unpotable water instead. Who benefits from this I am sure one could accurately guess. Councils continue to fight the more mainstream introduction of waterless sewerage treatment ie composting toilets. The removal of the old thunderbox systems many might see as a retrograde step these days.
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Why is there a whole genre of web articles entitled āN Weird Hacksā for any N between 3 and 50. And why āweirdā? Why not effective, or useful, or practical? I would rather they were canny instead of uncanny. Pure prejudice I know.
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It is called click-bait. If it was called ā10 good water saving hacksā, it doesnāt create the same curiosity as ā10 weird water saving hacksā. One is more likely to succumb to their curiosity with the āweirdā one.
More click-bait is more adverting dollars.
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Yes I get that but why does āweirdā work? It isnāt as if many people who fall for clickbait know it means, uncanny, eldritch, or oneās fate, they know queer, strange or not like us. Furriners and those with habits we donāt understand or we fear of are weird - how is that attractive?
Cyberspace is a strange and terrible world.
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