Are you a garden keeper that always thought in mind how to conserve water? If yes, this article is for you.
Conserving water is crucially advised to us people who always rely on water. The reason why we need to apply these practices is to minimize the drought and water shortage that may happen (hopefully not) in due time.
According to Marni Evans (2020), by reducing the amount of water that we use every day, we can better protect against future drought in the coming years. Hence, we can also help to preserve the environment for a better future.
Good to know that we gathered and classified some of the easiest and most effective ways to conserve water that you can apply for yourself, especially from your gardening, which could also help you to become a better gardener.
Simple Tips On How To Conserve Water
Some of these simple tips can be done without any hassle. Take time to read and maybe you can apply it for yourself too.
- Use recycled household water for watering your plants. It is the easiest way to conserve water. You can save the water that you have already used for your household chores to use again in your garden to water the plants afterward. You can put it in an empty bucket to store.
- Use water-saving pots or containers for your plants. You can use some pots or containers to plant for your plants that don’t lose water enough. This can save you from always watering them every hour of the day.
- Water the plants at the right time. We recommend that you need to water your plants in the early morning and the late afternoon since plants are very sensitive to temperature changes, this is based on the article that we gathered. At this time, temperatures are very low for the plants and this is the perfect time to water them to avoid temperature shock. Usually, if you find the soil is too dry, it is also the best time to water them. However, it varies depending on the type and requirements it meets. The most important thing is to water them with enough water.
- Use mulch to slow water evaporation. Use mulch like straws, shredded bark, compost, stones or pebbles, or wood chips to layer it to the soil, usually 2 to 3 inches deep, to maintain the moisture of the soil and to minimize sprouting of weeds if you also want to achieve free weeds from your garden.
- Install a flexible sprinkler in your garden. If you are the type of person that always has no time in watering the plants, installing an adjustable sprinkler in your garden might help you. This way, you also save enough water because the device can offer multiple watering patterns. It allows you to direct the water to where it is needed and off it after a few minutes of watering.
- Always apply a suitable amount of water. Plants typically require enough water to keep the soil around the stem of the plant moist for approximately 3 or 4 inches deep. This is said by a professional home and garden specialist Maggie Moran on a forum site. Gardeners must know how much water they need to use so that they can avoid overwatering and even underwatering that can affect the growth of their plants.
- Just collect rainwater and reuse it for garden use. Same as what we mentioned earlier. You can recycle any old water in your house. If you don’t consume any household water, you can also use the rainwater that you’ve been collecting lately and use it for watering your plants.
- Check the hose for leaks. It is advisable to check and change your hose washers at the start of every season. This is to ensure that there is no leaking visible in your garden hose. This way, you are saving water and saving you money because of paying high water bills in the future.
- Use watering techniques for garden uses. Allow yourself to apply watering techniques for garden tasks like using watering cans for watering mass of plants, or try automated irrigation systems for convenient watering.
- Try to water the roots, not the leaves. It is best to advise watering the root system rather than its shoot system because it is where the bulk of the water is uptake by most of the plants. Leaves can also absorb water, but allowing yourself to water your plants into the leaves will also have a higher chance of evaporation.
Water-Saving Devices For Garden
You can also try the following ways below if you are not satisfied with the simplest one. These tips are time-consuming but presume to be very effective when it comes to conserving water for your garden.
- Install a rain gauge or a water timer. Provide a rain gauge to keep track of the rainfall. With this kind of technique, you will base your watering on the weather. Rainfall provides enough moisture to the soil that prevents you from overwatering the plants. Same also for the water timer, this allows you to detect how moist the soil is.
- Make a rain garden. The advantage of having a rain garden is that it can collect rainwater from the water runoff, soak underground afterward. Rain gardens can also help filter out pollutants in runoff, mentioned by the United States Environmental Protection.
- Use Cisterns to collect rainwater. It provides large water storage to harvest rainwater. Large cisterns have a pump to speed the water flow from the tanks.
- Install Drip Irrigation. It is the most efficient water and nutrient delivery system for growing crops or plants. It allows delivering an exact amount of water from the plants, which can also produce higher yields while saving on water (Netafim India).
- Reduce the part of your lawn. You can renovate the style of your lawn by making a deck for outdoor living and dining rooms.
How to Save Water Using Your Plants?
- Classify your Plants by water needs. All you need to do is to group those thirsty plants altogether. Separate those plants that are tolerant of drought. So that you can water those thirsty plants all in one.
- Pick Low Water-Used Plants for your garden. Draught-tolerant or native plants are also good for conserving water because they naturally use less water rather than those plants that always rely on water to survive. Sansevieria (Snake Plant) and Aglaonema are some of the examples of low water-use plants that are suitable for your garden and also for your indoor house.
- Try planting by block. You can group your plants into blocks instead of rows. This is more efficient to choose when planting them in your garden because it provides easy and reachable access when you are going to water your plants soon. This is most applicable for those people who have vegetable gardens.
What’s Next?
Choosing to save water is the best decision you can make today. We hope that these tips that we gathered in this article will help you to save more water. Take your time to apply these ways to your garden, or even in your daily activities. If you take some tips and apply them for yourself, you are declining your monthly water bill and taking part to save the environment. Have fun and make the world become a better place again.