Peter Harden has continued hosing without fear despite the English government’s recent announcement that garden hose watering is now prohibited throughout the west of the nation.
That is because Harden’s paddock is the greenest on the block since he has been collecting rainwater for almost 50 years and storing it in enormous catch thanks.
Peter Harden, an 82-year-old retired teacher who has lived in his house for 52 years, claimed that after a well-known English drought in 1976, he constructed his first rainwater capture tanks.
The avid gardener noted that UK droughts were becoming more severe and was motivated to take action after traveling to Europe with his wife.
Over the course of 50 years, we frequently visited ancient Greek and Roman villages while on vacation in Europe, according to Harden.
The enormous number of home subterranean cisterns that the Romans and others built in advance to collect rainwater for extremely dry seasons always astounded us.
In light of this experience, I steadily expanded the number and size of my rainwater catch tanks until, around 15 years ago, I had nine 375-liter tanks that were entirely supplied by rainwater from the bungalow’s guttering.
But why such a commitment? In the UK, Peter lives in one of the driest regions. Although the clay beneath his home in Ingoldsby, Lincolnshire, does hold water, the clay begins to split as soon as the UK experiences a drought.
A hose pipe ban has been implemented in some sections of the West Country as a result of the region currently facing its worst drought in 26 years.
‘The region where we live has one of the lowest national average rainfalls. We get around 22 inches a year,’ said Harden, who added two extra 1,000 liter (250 gallon) intermediate bulk containers to his nine catch tanks roughly eight years ago and only just added another pair.
The 375-liter catch tanks are used to fill part of the bulk water containers, which are located at the bottom of the garden.
He continued, ‘I pump water through a garden hose from one of the tanks through a spray attachment to the garden hose using an electrically powered submersible water pump.’
As the water level in one tank drops, the other tanks receive a gravity feed through the connecting pipes to level out.
I am waiting to replace three of my original 375-liter tanks because they have subsequently stopped working. Additionally, I’m attempting to purchase two more 1,000-liter bulk containers to expand my water storage capacity.