Saving Water in Small Ways

I lived in Vancouver for nine years, back in the 1980s and 1990s. I knew that it rained a lot in Vancouver but I don't think I ever really considered the overall climate in Vancouver. Admittedly, I was gone most summers, out in the bush, doing research for my thesis. I never really experienced the dry days of a Vancouver summer. Somehow, I always thought that all of Canada had four seasons - spring, summer, winter, fall. That isn't actually true. The southwest coast of British Columbia, including Vancouver Island, could best be described as having a two-season climate - the rainy season and the dry season.

Living on the east coast of Vancouver Island, we have become very familiar with this climate. Our lawn is lush and green from October to May. From June to September, the grass turns yellow and goes dormant. Hardly anybody here waters their lawns during the dry season - and apparently this has been the case for decades. People recognize instinctively that we are on an island, and despite the rain that we get in the rainy season, water can be in short supply.

Lawn in mid-June

This past Monday, our city went to Watering Restrictions - Level 2. That means that we (with an odd house number) can use sprinklers on Sundays and Thursday, but not between the hours of 10 am and 6 pm. Watering the garden by hand is allowed at any time, as long as you use a hose attachment with a shut-off. There are other restrictions that don't really affect us - hosing down sidewalks, washing cars, power-washing decks or houses. We do none of those. And if ever we hit Level 4 watering restrictions, we would only be allowed to sprinkle once a week. But we're not too concerned at this point. We don't water our lawn and are proud of it's golden colour. Of course, patches of green survive where the weeds still thrive. Dandelions and hawk-weed apparently have deep roots.

This year, however, we are more mindful of how we use and misuse water. We've been following the news of the California drought and know that climate change is upon us. What are some of the small ways in which we can conserve water?

Rain Barrel
This is an obvious solution, and one that is apparently quite easy to set-up. It does, however, require fairly regular showers during the summer to be useful. We are looking at putting a rain barrel in place to catch the run-off from our shed roof.

Grey Water
There are all sorts of complicated systems that you can install to divert waste water from your kitchen sink into grey-water collection systems. We're not there yet. We're talking about something more basic. We considered how much water we waste in the kitchen and the bathroom and came up with a solution:

• waiting for the shower water to warm up - we now hold a big bucket under the tap until the water hits the right temperature and then pull the shower transfer thingie - 2-3 gallons each time (oh, and we don't shower every day)
• filling water bottles at the kitchen sink, waiting for the water to get cold enough - we now have a big bucket in the second sink, over which we fill the water bottle - sometimes as much as 1 gallon of water saved
• filling pet water dish - dump the stale water in the bucket and rinse the dish over the bucket - 1/2 gallon saved
• rinsing vegetables from the garden - used to do it in the sink but now do it in the bucket - 2 gallons saved
• rinsing fingers underneath the tap, like after chopping vegetables - we now do that over the bucket saving a little bit everytime
• water from boiling eggs - goes into the bucket and the cold water rinse goes into the bucket as well

Those are the main things we're doing right now. We don't have any soap in the water that we save in the two buckets. When the buckets need to be dumped, we have a green rubber garbage bin outside the patio doors, on the deck. If the water doesn't have too many bits of flotsam (like the tub water), we just pour it into the bin. If there is a fair bit of debris in the water, I take it outside and pour it on various bushes which normally don't get watered with the hose. We can use the water in the garbage bin to fill watering cans.

Does it take a bit of extra effort? Yup. Does it make a difference? Definitely. It is satisfying to know that we are conserving water which would normally just go down the drain. Fresh, clean water is a precious resource and we are blessed to have a relatively abundant supply. But it is time to start appreciating it and not wasting it.