Search Results for: label/water conservation

357 results

Emergency water storage

Mrs. Homegrown
Preparedness, Water and Power
24 Comments
We’re finally ready for The Big One. In terms of emergency preparedness, we were pretty well set in terms of food, light, fuel, etc., but we didn’t have much water. Just some jugs, a rain barrel that’s empty most of the year, and the water in our hot water tank. This lack made me nervous, so we finally did took the bull by the horns–or the bung hole…  How much water should you store?  1 gallon of water p...

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Essential System #9 – Hydration

Mr. Homegrown
Preparedness
RLeave a comment
As we’ve noted before you can go about three days without water, but you’ll be feeling mighty crabby after just a few hours without it. We’ve got a number of water sources around the homestead, with a few more back-ups in the works. First off it pays to have some plastic water jugs around – figure two liters a day per person minimum. There are stricter standards for tap water in this banana republic we call the USA than f...

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Water Conservation

Mr. Homegrown
Water Conservation
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“the price we paid was the price men have always paid for achieving a paradise in this life — we went soft, we lost our edge.”-Frank Herbert Dune SurviveLA was planning on discussing rainwater collection today, but we realized that we would be getting ahead of ourselves without first discussing what we call BOC, or boring old conservation. So before delving into greywater and rainwater harvesting it’s time to assess where yo...

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Barley Water

Mrs. Homegrown
Food, Recipes
25 Comments
Being an American, barley water is not part of my mental landscape. Perhaps it was big in the U.S. back in the Victorian era, but it seems to have faded from our national consciousness. Indeed, if you’re one of our American readers, you may be asking now: what the heck is it? My fellow Americans, barley water is a drink made from barley, lemon and sugar, known to be cooling and refreshing in the summer and perhaps somewhat healthy. Meanw...

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Pot o’ Goodness: Low, Low-Tech Water Conservation

Mrs. Homegrown
Water and Power, Water Conservation
14 Comments
Mrs. Homegrown here: Continuing on the greywater theme, on big cooking days, when I’m doing a lot of boiling, steaming, soaking and rinsing, I collect all that used water in a big pot and take it out to the garden to water the plants. It’s full of nutrients, and won’t cause any blackwater* problems as long as you: Use it immediately. It will turn foul if left to sit too long. Pour it straight into the soil–don’t s...

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Clean your bathroom without resorting to Poison

Mrs. Homegrown
Cleaning, Domesticus, How-to
30 Comments
...y not like, but which you can’t control. Housecleaning, however, is totally within your power to change. Cleaning this way also saves you money and cabinet space, reduces plastic waste and not least of all, protects our waters from chemical contamination. Just say no to chemical warfare in your home. It all starts with the Holy Trinity of Non Toxic Household Cleaning: White vinegar* Baking soda (sodium carbonate) Liquid castile soap, su...

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DIY Outdoor Shower

Mr. Homegrown
Water Conservation
4 Comments
Photo by the MacAllen Brothers Showers are overrated. The first step in considering whether to build an outdoor solar heated shower is to take a step back and consider boring old conservation. Shower less and make sure that your domicile is equipped with a low-flow shower head. Not only will you be saving water and burning less fossil fuels to heat that water, but your body odor will soon separate your real friends from superficial hangers-on....

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Out of Water!

Mr. Homegrown
Preparedness
1 Comment
There’s nothing like a utility outage to make one ponder the various Mad Max type scenarios that might play out when the power goes out for good and legions of zombified TiVo addicts stumble out onto the streets in search of the last remaining supplies of Doritos. Of all the utility outages we’ve experienced in our shabby 1920s bungalow, this weekend’s water outage was the most annoying. Other than the intenets, a couple of lig...

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Rain- The Best Gift of All

Homegrown Neighbor
rainwater harvesting
14 Comments
...past few years have been extremely dry here in the West. The year before last we literally had 3 inches of rain in L.A. So rain really feels like a gift from the gods. We had a decent rain recently and I have been using the water I harvested. As you can see in the photo, my downspouts go into a rain barrel. A slight design flaw I have discovered in hindsight is that the spout doesn’t attach directly to the barrel. There is screening over...

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Return of Bean Friday: Bean Broth or “Tuscan Crazy Water”

Mrs. Homegrown
Bean Fest, Food, Recipes, Reviews
5 Comments
Yep, Bean Friday rears its head again–or is it Frugal Friday? Whatever it is, I’ve got this thrifty idea for you. I read about in The Italian Country Table , by Lynn Rossetto Casper. We’ve had this book for years and years, and it has some really good recipes in it that have become standards in our house, along just with a couple of duds. I’d not paid attention to her entry on “Crazy Water” before, but by her...

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