Brian Minter: Critical to install supplemental water supply

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Water availability for our gardens is going to be in short supply this year for most of the province. It’s already late to be dealing with this critical issue, but there are many things we can do to help mitigate the restricted supply issue.

Soil preparation is one of the most important factors. We need to not only prepare larger planting spaces for shrubs, trees, small fruits and perennials, but we must also add more moisture retaining materials into our soils. Well-rotted manures, like mushroom compost, as well as rich, well broken-down compost with lots of leaf mould, and pre-bagged materials like Sea Soil will all help immediately. The long term benefits of these amendments will be evident as we get into our warmer and drier summer weather.

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Even our lawns should be aerated now and sand added to help grass roots go deeper into our soils. This will also help lawn grasses get through the summer when less water is available. It’s important to remember that lawn green spaces help cool our neighbourhoods, produce oxygen, and provide a home for so many worms and beneficial insects and micro-organisms in our soils. A lawn with good soil depth should be able to stay green with about one inch of water per week during summer.

Knowing the summer restrictions we face annually with city water supplies, and the concern this causes, I’ve really appreciated many folks emailing me regarding the issue of securing another source of water, especially for our trees and food gardens.

Rain barrels are certainly important, but they really do not provide enough water for the most critical water needs in summer when we experience longer periods of dry weather.

Cisterns seem to be a better solution where rainwater can be stored for a long period of time and hold considerably more volume.

To learn more about these options I contacted Southern Irrigation, an excellent water resource company with branches in Chilliwack and throughout Canada. They are Western Canada’s foremost provider of irrigation solutions and are leaders in drip irrigation systems. They deal mainly with larger agriculture projects but also service homeowners’ needs. The problem with smaller space lots and gardens today is, of course, where to place a cistern, especially with so many underground services.

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I spoke with Rene Van Leeuwen, who. is knowledgeable about water holding tanks. He suggested a 9,000-litre tank, about the size of a normal septic tank, as the most practical size, with the capacity to provide enough water to keep your plants alive and growing in a smaller garden.

Although these tanks can be placed above ground, there are advantages to burying them underground. In-ground tanks give you more garden space, keep the water from both freezing and overheating, and also keep the water free from algae and other problems encountered with exposed water storage units.

For larger gardens, bigger cisterns can be installed, but they are more expensive and need bigger equipment to install. Van Leeuwen liked the fact that the large tank could be handled by two people and could be hand dug and installed in-ground. For more volume, he mentioned that two or even three tanks could be connected.

All home eavestrough downspouts can be connected to a pipe system that can direct all the roof run-off directly to the cistern.

With either a submersible, or non-submersible pump, connected to a hose and an electrical outlet, you can easily water your garden.

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He commented that this system is not meant to be used for sprinkling lawns but will prove adequate for hand watering. The amount of water is not going to last all summer but is a backup resource when your plants need water and there is no other supply available.

We will continue to deal with climate extremes and hot, dry summers. Traditional water resources may no longer be adequate to supply water for our food plants, ornamental trees and containers. With a cistern in place, you can harvest rainwater year-round. It’s late in our rainy season, but I think we should consider this water supply option as soon as possible.

The installation costs of these systems is important and Van Leeuwen shared approximate costs: quality tanks, which are corrugated for extra strength, are about $3,000 each and a good pump would be in the $1,000 range. Installation and connecting the eavestroughs and downspouts is also to be considered but, with one in place, you will have this extra water resource to drawn from for years.

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