The Little Green House :: Waste not, want not :: July

I have finally taken the lead from my friend Ilse and am siphoning bath and shower water into the garden to water the parched lawn. Ayrton and I have it down to a fine art already after only two go’s.

The easy no-sucking way to siphon water from your bath to your garden (you need two people):

Cut a piece of hose long enough to reach well into your garden, all the way up the wall and through the bathroom window into the bath.
Person 1 is in the bathroom and holds the hose to the tap until the water runs through to the other end of the pipe.
Once the water is flowing through, Person 2 in the garden puts their thumb over the end of the hosepipe and shouts up for Person 1 to switch off the tap and submerge their end of the pipe into the bathwater.
The vacuum created will suck all the water out of the bath and into the garden below.

Our shower is over the bath, so we just shower with the plug in to collect the shower water too. This was also a lesson to us about how much water we are using for a shower, short showers are the answer.

Great tip Tracy. Not having done this but having tried siphoning petrol, I probably would have tried the sucking method which would not have been too good.

Comment by Stuart — July 19, 2006 @ 2:32 pm

True, a lot of effort though. At most hardware stores you can get a $2 plastic siphon pump with a bulb on top that you squeeze. You can attach a 13mm hose to the side of your house near the bathroom window and attach the end of the siphon to that.

Comment by David — April 21, 2007 @ 2:58 am

Thanks for the tip David. That’s handy to know. We do plan to finally sort out the downpipe so that we can fit the Water Two valve this year and easily divert our bathwater to our water butts.

Comment by Tracy — May 29, 2007 @ 8:18 am