Sticking to Our Water Saving Habits

It’s spring and the days are getting warm. Mandatory water rationing has been ended, thanks to recent rains. It must be boom times for plant sales at the nurseries!

Again, I see lawn sprinklers on in the heat of the day, people leisurely hosing down driveways and sidewalks, luxuriating in the waste of water. Gutters along streets which were generally dry for the last year appear on their way to growing algae again!

Has there been a big change in the water outlook for Southern California? Not hardly! Decades of poor water reserve planning are not erased by one above-average winter of rainfall.

We had a look at our future over the last year. This region has been developed without concern for secure and adequate sources of water. We have cleverly bought up land and water rights in places far away, then spirited water away through pipelines and aqueducts hundreds of miles long in order to slake our thirst.

Natural lakes, rivers and farmland in other counties have long suffered for our swimming pools and gardens.

I would suggest that those of us who plan to stay in Southern California should make it a point to continue the water conserving practices we established over the last year.

Taking shorter showers, washing cars with a bucket of water rather than a hose, using drought-tolerant landscaping or at least deep-rooted, un-thirsty grass for lawns. By doing these things we can protect our own future. We can postpone the day when we must take expensive actions to increase our water supplies.

We are like overweight folks who have been on a successful diet. When the diet ends, we must stick to the habits we have formed, otherwise we will be doomed to repeat the “water diet” all too soon.

GUY C. DENECHAUD

San Gabriel