Good advice Len. Here in our hot climate, (at least in July and August it is), I use drip lines to avoid wasting water, but actually everyone really should. And even though water is precious, you can't believe the waste I see.

Greg
Southern Nevada

Ditto & Amen!! My bathwater flushes the toilet and waters the yard. My kitchen rinse water [B4 & after cooking] goes on the compost pile. I hand water right on each plant. And mulch like a madwoman! I haven't YET got set up to re-use my laundry water. That is yet to be done. I'm with Len for not finking on my neighbors ... but someone upstreet from me runs water down the gutter nearly every day. Haven't gone to check ...

Having said that ... CA's population has tripled in the last 50 years and is set to triple again in the next 30 years. Similar population increases in the Western states who have a share of the Colorado River water, means no matter how careful we are with our water, the day will come when water becomes REALLY REALLY scarce. Our city/county leaders are talking 'TOILET TO TAP' with more force than ever before. [that's a lot of semi-treated water going out to sea every day][I hope they don't put the seawatr intake for the new desalination plant next to the sewer outfall pipe into the ocean ... nah, silly me, they would NEVER do that.]
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Check out population increase in your state:
http://quickfacts.census.gov/qfd/img/usa-blue.gif

Here is a link that might be useful: Census Population Clock

No serious water shortages here but i quite agree about saving and re-using water. Even where water is abundant it is usually pumped out of the ground which costs significant energy, so saving water is also saving energy.

I run the graywater into a surface pit and then drain by siphon to irrigate plants. Also I have about 300 gallons of rain-catchment capacity, not a lot but it is enough to avoid using pumped water for the garden except in the summer when dry period extends more than a couple of weeks. This summer, so far I have only used municipal water in the garden 2 or 3 times. Last summer not at all.

even though water is not short from the tap it still take energy and resultant pollution to produce it so we still need to try and cut our use of town water for that reason alone. those with planty of rain are lucky those with too much rain be a bit like not having enough except you can't maybe do much about it.

on our latest water bill our home used 120 or so litres of water a day the suburban average use was just over 400, that says there are a lot wasting water gowing on out there. the government conservation target is 200 litres per day per person that figure in my books encourages waste, we need a better way.

len

http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/climate-change/
on-the-frontline-of-climate-change-2056322.html

http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2009/04/murray-darling/
draper-text/1

Len is a bit to the north of the Murray-Darling Basin but these articles illustrate the situation.

Terran

Here is a link that might be useful: On the frontline...

g'day terran,

good illistrations but being manipulated in my books.

i'm no believer in this furphy climate change thing, yes the climate is changing but not in that way as is promoted. those pictures realy show the results of man's greed and mismanagement and lack of understanding of the habitat, it has been occuring long before this C/C thingy was made popular. and not just the results of mismangement in that local area the mismangement up in our state and along the way adds to it as it is from up here that the rains should fall and rivers run to fill that basin, and that is simply not happening now for around 20 or so years, flood rains that is. that is 1000's of kilometers of silted up winding water courses.

basically the the manipulation of the snowy river and the holding up of water in locks to provide hydro' power for the power station they built at the same time plus the rampat spread of agriculture and its' insattiable thirst for water.

what is not shown is the rising salt affected mega acres all due to agriculture without controls. that area was our food bowl but no more just acres and aces of devistation.

yes a picture might speak a thousand words but are they the correct words?

i live a long way north up the east coast, but this agricultural and forestry along with development destruction goes on up here until the last tree falls.

len

Hey Len,

My take on Climate Change is politicians fiddle while "Rome" burns. The scientists may or may not be correct, but I think it is prudent to react to the potential situation in a responsible manner. If we wait to act until there is a final determination of the matter and the CC proponents turn out to be correct then we have condemned ourselves.

I found the National Geographic article informative. In the American arid west, there are the same problems with the buildup of salt in the soil and water shortages and/or drought. The best recourse is to build up the organic matter in the soil to buffer the salts and to retain moisture.

Corporatists and their political subordinates are trying to set up systems to make money on the CC controversy. That is what they are good at - gaming. I'll be in the garden trying to improve the bit that is in my care.

Good luck with your conservation efforts.

Terran

The rains should fall but have not for 20 years. That doesn't seem like climate change?

yes terran & pnb',

eplant teh habitat when faremres and loggers have decimated what was there, nothing can be done about the errosion but the new habitat will repair that along the way.

the habitat keeps stops us from freezing over here many areas geting lots more coldest days and hottest days can all be tied back to habitat destruction mostly for agriculture.

over here they know that most of the rising salt was caused by removal of the trees from the high ground so instead of water having a way into the aquafa it runs off to the lowland and over time caused rising salt along with the addition of too much irrigation another reason to explain those pic's in those links.

so habitat destruction leads to a sort of climate change not theirs but for areas. and if there realy is a carbon issue!! forests live on carbon and produce oxygen and create rain clouds and protection to the soil. or has that now changed in this scientifically mixed up world?

len

len

You think global warming is a hoax? Let me guess you also have problems with dodos and taz tigers digging up your gardens as well. Or does your pet unicorn keep them from your yard?

Some areas of the globe are having winters that are colder than normal because the polar ice melts are changing ocean currents. For example in Northeastern US, the tail end of the Gulf Stream used to moderate their winter temps, but it now fails to do so because of so much cold water melting into the North Atlantic from Greenland. I'm not as familiar with ocean currents in the Southern Hemi, but similar currents are surely being changed.

In the US last winter, we has record snow falls in many areas, but that did not mean the winter was colder than past years, simply that more moisture was in the air from warmer oceans.

The average temps globally are increasing at an alarming rate, despite the protests of the misinformed or the assurances of scientist on the payroll of energy companies.

Len, certainly environmental destruction causes climate change, I agree. We have known that for at least a century. Environmental destruction and pollution has now reached the scale where climate is changing everywhere, even the areas that do not seem so damaged.

Just for fun, here is an isolated, real life example of water use, you be the judge if it is being wasted, I'm curious to read the replies - A small town of 200 people consumes about 20,000 GPD of water, of that, appx. 80% goes through the sewer pipes (leaking the other 20% on the way) and ultimately ends up in a sewer lagoon where mother nature takes care of the water portion of the sewage through soil infiltration and the rest through evaporation. What goes into the ground it seems to me would ultimately be recharging the aquifer (a yummy thought, I know) and that which is evaporated ultimately ends up in clouds somewhere and falling as precipitation elsewhere. I wonder, where is the wasted water?