There's a drought/ hosepipe ban in the offing

I have a mate who lives near me that can't have a water meter, so she
uses her hose pipe every day, evening watering her Grass.
She admits she wouldn't if on a meter. This is totally the wrong attitude IMO.

 

My OH has been watering the plants in the big flower bed in the front garden and all the plants in the 2 beds under the front windows, using a hosepipe. (We have a water meter).

There is an Open Gardens Weekend next week in this area, and although my (rear) garden isn't taking part we are taking part in the Children's Trail using the front garden, so thought we'd better make it look colourful for those passing by. After that, if a ban comes into force then it will be long term planting only, not the bedding unless my OH feels up to it.

I was asked by the organiser if I would consider taking part, but due to family circumstances declined. To be honest I'm glad, having a South facing back garden and no decent rain to speak of since April makes it hard going as it is.
I did use the "sprinkler" 2 weeks ago as everything was really struggling, and made sure it was the soil getting a really good drenching, not the plants.

Lugging watering cans around is a good workout though, and if a hosepipe ban is introduced then "out back" I will be concentrating on the newly planted, the roses, and the Heleniums which are already putting on a good show and will hopefully continue way into Autumn.

My OH's love (the lawn, not yours truly ), is baked yellow, but there's no way he would water it. Even he says that's a step too far.

 

I am on a water meter so rarely if ever get out the hose. I do have a water butt, that is almost empty right now, and keep water from washing vegetables, letting the kitchen tap run hot etc into a couple of watering cans kept by the back door.

I am currently watering just plants in pots, plants that have recently gone into the borders - and also a street tree that was planted outside my house at the end of March. It's a Malus 'Street Parade', a fine young tree but also quite large (about 10' tall, I'd guess 3 years old?). It's officially watered every 1-2 weeks, but I have been adding in an extra 10 gallons of metered water twice a week (easily done as it has one of those Gator bags) to help it cope with this prolonged spell of very dry and very hot weather.

I let established plants tough it out and I'm surprised how well most of them are doing; autumn mulching helps, so too does thinking what kind of plants you want to grow in the first place and being prepared to experiment a bit. I no longer have a lawn, and what's in the borders has also changed over the years. Salvias and alliums and agapanthus do increasingly well, but for the first time this year I see the day lilies struggling and may want to review/ replace those, this autumn. Ditto hydrangea 'Souvenir du Docteur Jamain', which has been looking pathetic for weeks now - unlike 'Lanarth White' which did get some of its young leaves scorched, but I snipped those off and now it has bounced back.

 

Most of my containers are are on a drip system - last time we had a hose pipe ban (2022 I think) I asked Yorkshire water if I could continue to use it, pointing out that it uses less water than watering everything with cans, and they gave permission. I'm already syphoning my bathwater onto the back garden most nights, and if the butt in the back garden gets empty/very low I'll syphon it into there to use the next day. Newly-planted stuff in the ground (ie planted this year) would get watered with cans or maybe I'll see if I can arrange a seep hose to get them all.

 

Not far from here is a village called Youlgrave or Youlgreave or Youlgreve, or about 20 other different names, which still has to this day its own water supply drawn from an old disused mine working. They were saying a couple of weeks ago that they were surprised at how early in the year the water pressure had dropped this year. They had their well dressings last week (for those who don’t know about well dressings in Derbyshire there’s a little explanation attached below. We went to see them and were shocked at how dry the clay base had become and how the designs had fallen to the ground in chunks. So sad. It’s common to see cracks develop in the images but I’ve never seen whole constructions break up. Here is more about well dressings:

home

 

If you have sufficient storage, your water company will deliver a tanker full at a commercial rate. There is no restriction on useage. So to fill the swimming pool is possible whatever the prevailing weather......

 

I have enough water collected to keep the newly planted birch going. The few planters can be watered with excess water.
I watered the roots of some plants this morning, the third time since the 2nd of March when this awful weather started.
I changed the planting after the 2022 drought and the garden should keep going in the following months.
My worries are more about if it will ever rain again and when does this endless sunshine stop. One reason to move to England (apart from following OH who had already returned the year before) was that I was no longer able to cope with the permanent sunny, dry and hot weather in Berlin.
I welcome a hosepipe ban hoping the weather changes on the very same day.

 

I save so much ££ by having a water meter, compared to a flat rate that I don’t worry if I do have to wash the car or water the garden (not in a drought of course).

 

As a long time (25 years ) user of water meters, they won't really make any difference to the actual usage ( could prove cheaper in some cases). What really matters is whether we are happy to use it ad lib or whether we think of it as a resource which we're lucky to have on tap and act accordingly.

 

I'm better off with a water meter than without, even if I water the garden, if necessary. Without a water meter I'd be charged based on the rateable value of property last calculated pre poll tax and pre council tax.

 

I have a water meter and do use the hose and my water bill comes in at £32 a month, this is set to go up with the increase of water charges, to stop sewage going into rivers.

Also in Bexleyheath I haven’t had any significant rain since February/March, whenever there is a threat of rain on the BBC Weather App and it doesn’t happen. So a ban is on its way and when it does it will come in very quick.

 

We haven’t got a meter even though we ticked the box saying we were happy to get one some years ago. I admit I haven’t chased it up. Our next door neighbour had one installed and they installed it in the house which means her outside tap is “before” the meter. She did point that out to them at the time. I think the issue was that our supply is shared until literally just at the house so they couldn’t fit in anywhere else.

If that’s the case we would presumably be the same. Anyway I don’t water the garden except for my small veg beds, pots and the greenhouse but our collected rainwater ran out some time ago. I’m quite pleased how the veg bed is doing as I’ve only watered my sweetcorn and beans once since planting. Pots of ornamentals get the washing up water. We collect about 6-8 gallons a day ( we haven’t a dishwasher) so that also enables me to give some to any new/recently planted specimens in the garden.

Am busy researching waterbutts so we can hopefullly install some to collect rainwater from the house. It grieves me how much rain we aren’t currently collecting. Space is quite limited near the one possible down pipe and it’s also in quite a prominent position so I need attractive, slimline ones. I haven’t looked for a few years so hoping more options are available. At the moment we have three small 100L collecting rain off the shed and four 330L from the greenhouse.

What I would like is an underground tank but a girl can dream…

 

The only person I know who would have paid more with a water meter than using the rateable had a 4/5 bedroom house with ensuite, a bathroom and a downstairs toilet. He also had four children including at one point 3 teenage girls.