Coping with the Dry Spell

How is your garden faring in the hot weather?

I've just got back from holiday.   When I left we'd had a couple of days of warm weather already, but everywhere was looking green and healthy. I came back this weekend to find my grass looking very brown - not something I've seen for a few years I think.

My Dad came to tell me this morning that he's got all his water saving methods going.  He was heading for the garden carrying his washing up bowl to water the pots on his patio.

"And I've got my shower water to empty for later," he said.


The great thing about grass is that it will always come back green again as soon as the rain returns, so there's no need to water your lawn.  Containers will need watering, but that doesn't always mean you need to use water from the tap.  In dry weather, plants in the ground will fare much better, than in containers.  For the last few years since Frank told us his tomato plant tip, we've planted our tomatoes in the ground so their roots can roam to find their own water.  This is cheaper, greener and way less labour intensive than 'grow bags' which dry out so quickly.

From 101 Ways to Live Cleaner and Greener for Free

In May and June this year, I ran the first pilot of my Dustbin Diet workshops in a local secondary school.  These workshops aim  to raise awareness of how much we waste and to encourage students to think about simple ways in which we can all reduce waste. The students then put together their own version of my book, 101 Ways to Live Cleaner and Greener for Free, which the school can then sell to students, families and friends in order to encourage the waste reduction message.

Several of the students suggested ways of putting waste water to good use and here's a selection of their tips from the first school edition of 101 Ways to Live Cleaner and Greener for Free.

Gardening - It is all so much effort!

Or is it?

Well it does require some effort, most definitely, but I can't help thinking that sometimes we don't do ourselves any favours by the way we garden.

I have long associated the growing of tomatoes with the 'Growbag' technique.  Stick a couple of grow bags on your patio and plant them up with a couple of tomato plants in each and low and behold you will have tomatoes in abundant supply all through the summer. BUT probably only if you remember to water them every evening. Ughhh! Can you be bothered with that?

The thing we all know about Growbags is they dry out very quickly. So why do we insist on planting our tomatoes in them?

This year we decided to do things a bit differently.  Instead of using grow bags we planted our tomato plants straight into the ground along a post and rail fence.  If I remember rightly they got a couple of cans of water over them when they were first planted and I pulled up the weeds from round them early on but since then they've been entirely left to fend for themselves.  If they want water then they have to send out their roots to look for water. If they want to survive among the weeds then they have to be strong and be the fittest.

It seems to be working!

You want water? Find your own!

So despite the money saving (no grow bags to buy or water to pay for) and the huge saving on time and effort we are still being rewarded with lots of tomatoes and they taste wonderful.