I'm just curious. Suppose your small community had a serious water shortage that could affect the safety of the community and people were encouraged to remind their neighbors of this dire situation if they saw them watering their lawns. What would your response be to this news?
Would you:
1. mind your own business and just hope for the best while multiple neighbors water their lawns through the hottest part of the day?
2. water your own lawn, because if the Joneses grass is green, yours has to be green too?
3. do as recommended and give warning to your neighbors, even if they take offense that you are meddling in their business?
4. have another response? If so, what would that be?
I'll tell later what I did, but I just wanted to know what you would do.
Here's what I did. I made a few copies of the emergency warning and went to three neighbors, (a fourth was not at home), and assuming they had not heard, I politely told them of the breaking news and handed them a copy. One neighbor told me she had to water because she had just fertilized her lawn and kept watering. The other seemed offended at first but after chatting for a few minutes she realized the seriousness of the situation and seem grateful for the info. The third was a boy and my son told him about the situation and he stopped watering too. Last evening another neighbor watered his flowers with a sprinkler, but technically he wasn't watering his lawn, so I said nothing to him.
Tonight someone in the neighborhood placed a copy on doors to let people know. I'm glad they did that. It is hard to watch my things dry up but I'm collecting water as we wash our hands and bathe and using this to water my plants. I don't think the soap will harm them, who knows, maybe I won't get any more insects.
I'd talk to my neighbors in a nice way, they might not have heard about the ban on watering lawns.
ReplyDeleteWhat irks me is that those with automatic sprinkler systems often don't turn them off. They act as though the watering ban, or request to water every other day like we have, doesn't apply to them! Or maybe they just don't know how to turn their sprinkler systems off...
I think that I would make a joke out of it, and tell them about the ban, and warn them that if their lawn is the only green one, everyone on the street is going to know that they have not stopped watering. Some people think that they are above these kinds of bans.
ReplyDeleteHey Robin,
ReplyDeleteI'm with Carol. I'd ask in a polite way if they'd heard of our serious water shortage and that there's a ban in effect. That should impress most logical people not to break the law.
If they continued, then I would take action by reporting them. No one should be above the law.
Hi! First and foremost I love your garden pictures. I have no idea how I came accross your blog, but I have it saved in favorites.
ReplyDeleteA couple of years ago we had a water shortage and this idiot was running a sprinkler. The rest of our yards were brown and his wash lush green. I called him up and he basically laughed and told me to mind my own business. I called the County and he got written up.
In our community there is a bylaw. We can only water once a week, and the day is set by the number on your house. Our neighbours know when they are allowed to water. We hardly ever see sprinklers on anymore, and when we do, it is usually on people's correct "day" and after 7PM (that is part of the bylaw too).
ReplyDeletePeople get creative about watering. We are allowed to spray flowerbeds, but a lot of people use watering cans. This type of watering doesn't put as much of a demand on the system as sprinklers do.
I think if I was in your situation I'd talk to my local government and suggest they put more teeth into their "ban". I'd also suggest that telling people how to water without using up the community water supply would be a great addition to their notice. (I'm not sure if that's on the notice already.)