Daily water applied - rainfall amount = you saving water

Conserving water is always important, whether it concerns brushing your teeth or watering your grass. Whichever way you conserve water, it is important that we understand our total water use.

In a cooperative effort, the South Plains UWCD and the Terry County Garden Club are teaming up to promote water use awareness. It is vital to know exactly how much water plants need to reach their optimum result. 

In order to kick off the water use awareness project, we have developed a rainfall reporting method to help the Terry County Garden Club track the rainfall their garden plots receive on a weekly and monthly basis. Knowing the amount of rainfall determines how often plants are irrigated. A rain gauge will be placed at the community garden to record rainfall. The rain gauge measurement will then be updated on the calendar and on a handout in the plastic tube.

Garden club members are encouraged to periodically check the calendar and compare the amount of water applied with the amount of rainfall. Monitoring water use can save water and give your plants the best conditions possible to produce a great harvest.

While this specific project is designed for the garden club, you can get involved too by becoming more aware of your daily water use. We encourage you to practice good water conservation to prevent water waste both indoors and outdoors.

For more information, feel free to contact us at savegroundwater@gmail.com  

Just like the Terry County Garden Club, you can keep track of
 your water use and compare it to rainfall you receive. 

Don't forget to measure rainfall. Hopefully there's much more in store!

How will you save H2O this summer?

Car Washing with a Conscience

For most, washing a car consumes quite a bit of water. However, the Barton Springs/Edwards Aquifer Conservation District conducted a study to determine the exact amount of gallons used for washing nine cars. Depending on your "car washing conscience," you might even use less water than you would think.

The District used water meters to test gallons used per car. Check out the full article and complete newsletter by clicking on the link below.

BSEACD 2012 Newsletter

Texas Water Smart Campaign

Water is our survival. Without it, we cannot eat, drink or even be clothed. With supply dwindling and population growing, actions must be taken to conserve and maintain the water we have. The Texas Department of Agriculture is taking action by initiating the Texas Water Smart campaign. The water conservation  coalition consists of public and private entities who have a vested interest in decreasing water use across the state. The campaign mainly focuses on garden and lawn care, however, the primary goal is to conserve water in any way possible.

What's happened & what's new

It's been awhile since a blog has been posted and we apologize for that. It has been so long because a new education coordinator was hired. My name is Adeline Fox, and I am the new education coordinator. I have recently started working and look forward to continually learning and teaching others of the importance of water conservation.

Being this is the first blog post since March, I'll give you a rundown of events over the past three months. Throughout March calendar contest preparations began for Sandy Land and South Plains. Once April came around, I was able to give presentations to Meadow and Wellman fourth and fifth graders. It was my first time on  the job and the kids were great! We turned the corner and May was here. Throughout May, we judged the calendar contests and winners were presented awards before their summer vacations.

With school winding down and summer just around the corner, students are anxiously awaiting their break. I have started working on the calendars and hope to make 4-H and other public visits throughout the summer. I'm so glad to join the team and hope to hit the ground running full speed with activities and presentations. Thank you! 

Blog Down Until March 1st

The Education Cooperative Blog will be down until March 1st. You can visit our website at www.savingh2o.org for any upcoming activities or announcements.

Thank You

Saving Water During The Holidays

The holiday season is fast approaching….as well as that extra pant size. With more family time and bigger notches on your belt, comes gallons of wasted water. A typical American Christmas dinner for six people requires over 30,000 gallons of water. To help you stay green and on Santa’s water saving “good list”, listed below are 6 ways to save water during Thanksgiving.

1: Run the dishwasher efficiently.

Holiday guests dirty up many dishes, but when it's time to clean up, make sure that you're running your dishwasher in the most efficient way possible. Scrap plates instead of rinsing them with hot water, and making sure the dishwasher is full each time it runs. To save on the costs of heating water, avoid special cycles like pre-rinse and rinse-hold, which can be unnecessary, and stop the dishwasher before it's time to dry—the dishes can air dry, instead.

2: Cooking That Turkey

The best way to thaw a frozen turkey is in the refrigerator. It takes about 24 hours for every 5 pounds. If you are like many Americans, you need to 'speed-thaw' the bird. Keep the turkey in the original tightly sealed bag and place it in a clean and sanitized sink or food service safe pan. Submerge in cold water and change the cold water every 30 minutes. The turkey will take about 30 minutes per pound to thaw. Our imaginary turkey is 10 pounds so it would take 300 minutes with 10 changes of water. If you used only 10 gallons of water each time, it would add up to 100 gallons per turkey. If 1/2 of the turkeys in the US were speed-thawed, that's over 2 BILLION gallons of water. Any way you look at it, we use enough water to create a sizable Turkey Lake just to get Mr. Gobbler ready to cook.

3: Impressing your guest

Your having the family over at your house this year for Christmas? Impressing the aunts and uncles with a nice green lawn are always high on your list but unnecessary and wasteful. Cut down watering on cool and overcast days and don't water in the rain. Adjust or deactivate automatic sprinklers. You can save up to 300 gallons per time but opting to impress the extended family with your homemade bread.

4: Leave the China in the closet

Use Recycled-Paper Products instead of setting out your grandmother’s fine china. Products made from 100 percent recycled paper require much less water in their manufacturing than do those made from virgin paper. Who really wants to clean dishes anyways?

5: Cleaning up the Leftovers

Use the garbage disposal less and the garbage more (even better--compost!).

6: HALF TIME.

Approximately 30 million of us will watch football after the meal. The next spike occurs at halftime of the football game. Just like clockwork, American toilets will flush 30 million times and use 108 million gallons of water - enough water to fill an entire football stadium! Water efficient toilets would save 62 million gallons of that water. With the meal, time zones in the US go from east to west and stagger the energy and water use. The football game happens in real-time and much of the country hits the bathroom at the same time.

The point of all this is not to have you eating bologna sandwiches for Christmas, but as you let your belt out after dinner, you may want to give thanks for living in a time and place that allows such enormous energy and water use.