Kitchen Garden Forum

My allotment site in Plymouth has the dubious pleasure of becoming the 1st in the Southwest Water franchise area that has a permanant hosepipe ban the local council & SWW have changed all the taps to bib taps so hosepipes cannot attached and have told everyone including the elderly/disabled to water their plots with a watering can. They have also stated that they WILL prosacute any tenant found using a hosepipe on their plot, SWW & PCC claim that it is to conserve water? how much more will be wasted by water slopping out of watering cans as they are carried from the tap stands to the plots?

I would go straight back to the Council, in writing, from your Allotment Association and accuse them of discrimination against the elderly and the disabled who are unable to carry heavy watering cans. And I would contact your local papers and tell them too. They love a good controversial story. It's hardly water being wasted when it's used for growing food which won't have travelled several hundred air miles before it's being consumed. This kind of nonsense really makes my blood boil. There, now I've started another day with my blood pressure up several points !

Dear pump_king, i think i would also press along the lines of health and safty and a risk assessment, for the old and the disabled.
Although i suppose you might have to tread carefully incase they cut the water supply off completely.

We,ve never been allowed to use hosepipes on our allotments, and have stern notices about leaving taps running as we will have to pay for the water - I assume we are on a meter.

Going down at dawn one time i did find someone there with their hose giving everything a good soak.

Apart from that the allotment site is pretty diverse and includes people in their eighties, I guess people adapt their gardening to their levels of energy. Not ideal, so any suggestions on how to enable the less able would be of interest here too.

We're not allowed to use hosepipes either, only for filling a water butt. I wish we could use hosepipes becuase i've hurt my already bad back so many times shifting watering cans about.

A friend of mine has different lengths of hose, cut into various lengths. He puts one end into a water butt, sucks then leaves the hose on the bed that needs watering, moving it around a bit so that everything gets a good water.

Council can't do a bloody thing cos the hose isn't attached to anything......

Funny isn't it? We don't have any water on our allotments, and everyone just copes. I hve to admit though, that the weird and wonderful colection of 'water butts' is less than attractive. The feeling seems to be, if it holds water it'll do!

Surely one of the answers might be to consider independance, we have a water meter which is easily managed within thege bounds of the committee, we do not allow sprinklers, we allow hosepipes if not left unattended. We are also trying to encourage water collection from shed roofs etc.

I wonder if the new SW allotment association recently formed can help at all.

Good Luck Pump_King....

Compo

PS Good morning JB nice to see you up and about and on line also.

We are not allowed hosepipes and are given horsetroughs.

Dear Peter, the advantage of Horsetroughs, is that they are less likely to get kinks in.

oldherbaceous wrote:Dear Peter, the advantage of Horsetroughs, is that they are less likely to get kinks in.

They are quite convenient for ducking annoying people as well.

They are starting to sound better and better by the minute.

Plymouth City Council will not be suppling anything to store water in, if you have water butts and they empty you must wait til it rains or use a watering can to refill them.

Hi Pump King

It might be an idea to have a word with the council, as to my way of thinking, they are in breach of the Disability Discriminations Act. Their policy covers the whole of their property, including allotments that they own.

Just a thought, it will be worth the research. You should be provided with water butts at least.

Good luck