How to Make a Family Save Water

There are easy ways to help your family save water.

Saving water as a family is easier than you might think. Some ideas for saving water require changing habits, and other methods save water with very little effort. Saving water is good for your pocketbook and the environment, making the changes worth the small efforts they require. You can save hundreds or even thousands of gallons of water using these ideas.

Instructions

1. Encourage showers over baths. It may seem, with all that water running constantly, that a bath is the more conservative choice, but a bath takes 70 gallons to fill, while a shower uses only 10 to 25 gallons. Set a timer to keep shower time to five minutes. For the most water-conserving showers, install a low-flow shower head.

2. Don't flush trash. When you flush used tissues or cigarette butts down the toilet, you're using five to seven gallons of water. While you're thinking about your toilets, check to make sure that none of yours has a leak. Fill a half-gallon milk jug with water and place it in your toilet tank. This saves up to 10 gallons of water or more per day for a toilet that sees average use.

3. Turn off the tap whenever you can. Instead of letting water run when you brush your teeth, turn it on only for rinsing. This may save up to eight gallons of water per person per day. For men, fill the sink with a few inches of warm water to use when shaving instead of rinsing your razor under running water.

4. Don't prerinse most dishes before putting them in the dishwasher. Just scrape the leftover food into the garbage and load up the machine. When washing by hand, don't rinse under running water. Instead, wash the dishes and put them still soapy in a drainer in the sink. Rinse the dishes all at once to use the least amount of water. While you're in the kitchen, fill a pitcher with water to keep in the fridge. This will cut down on letting water run while it cools off for a drink.

5. Position your sprinklers so that all the water lands on your plants and not on the sidewalk or driveway. Plant drought-resistant plants that need the least amount of water. Plants that grow naturally in your area will require the least irrigation. Add a layer of mulch around your plants' roots to keep the water you do give them from evaporating too quickly.

References

• Earth Easy: 25 Ways to Conserve Water
• Real Simple: 9 Things You Can Do to Save Water
• EPA: Simple Ways to Save Water