Those of you in Australia, just how bad is the drought?

[talkingmongoose]

And has it had an impact on your life re. food pricing and similar.

I'm interested because I was born in Adelaide, and though I've lived in the UK for most of my life I always take an interest in news from Aus. We hear snippets about the drought - wine might be going up - but there hasn't been a great deal of coverage.

[superjo]

In Victoria, particularly Melbourne, our front and back yards have been reduced to dirt because we are not allowed to water lawns. Our gardens are able to be hand or drip watered for 2 hours twice a week and no washing cars, paths, windows, etc. We are trying to reuse all our grey water (showers, washing machines) to keep what grass we have left alive. The town my inlaws live has 3.5% (read 3.5%)town water storage, and have done so for about 5 years. Whereas in Sydney they have had so much rain lately, their water storage has gone from 30 something % to over 70%. In fact everything is going up lately - food, petrol, interest rates. Pretty depressing really

[ozchick]

ooo hello, I am in Adelaide. Drought is pretty bad here. We are in the middle of a record breaking heatwave too. So as well as no rain for months and months we have had the last 2 weeks of over 35 degrees every day. It's pretty dull, as with young kids it's hard to go out and do things in such boiling hot weather.

We too are on severe water restrictions, only allowed to water the garden once a week for 3 hrs. So we have buckets in the shower and use all our grey water on the lawns. People still water illegally though, much to the fury of local farmers who have had their water allowances slashed.

Adelaide is at the end of the Murray/Darling river system and is almost totally reliant on the river to provide water, due to the drought the water in the river is right down. So the lower Murray lakes are all shrinking rather worryingly and the Coorong is now almost ruined by the increase in salinity.

It's all rather worrying really. However, I am amazed that we don't have recycled water here or indeed de-salinisation plants. People here are mad and expect to be able to use fresh rainwater for flushing the loo etc.

[suzywong]

sorry to hear you Adelaiders are suffering, it's a torment with little kids when it's so hot isn't it?

I actually think it is the height of arrogance and pig-headedness to have private cosmetic lawns at all (I'm presuming you bought your house already with lawn laid ozchick). Most other European countries that experience a similar level of heat have rockeries and terraces and patios as the primary garden surface and for good reason. It's madness.
Over the last 3.5yrs we have been weaning MIL off watering her "lawn" on the front yard and have almost replaced it with wood chip and native shrubs.

FWIW, it's not too bad at all here in Perth, we had a solid 24 hours of rain a couple of weeks ago and the lakes seem to be fine.

[ghosty]

Yep - Melbourne is bad. And since I have been here (nearly a year now) prices of food and petrol have rocketed. Our local veggie shop is selling Royal Gala Apples for $5.99 a kilo .
I find it hard to cope with as in New Zealand is so green and wet and my DH keeps on at me about keeping my shower to under 4 minutes. What can you do in 4 minutes FFS? Wash your armpits and foof and that's about it really ...
We don't bath the children every night anymore ... DD has a bath 2 or 3 x a week and 1x a week is hair wash. DS has a short douse in the shower in the mornings (as he smells of wet dog if he doesn't).
The front and back lawns (rented house Suzy) are brown and dusty. The nice fruit trees are suffering the most.
My car is black but looks brown. On the rare occasions it does rain I park it out on the road so it gets a bit of a wash.
Nice not to be 'allowed' to wash windows though

[chloeb2002]

when we first got to brisbane it was bad but last week they lifted drought status here. i will be honest not totally sure what the current restriction is now. we had a wet hour a few weesk ago when people could wash there houses... etc. sorry but the need to wash your house still evades me and driveway? a good broom would surfice? but baths and showers were a nightmare. it hasnt stopped raining here since we arrived... looks out of window to big black clouds and wet stuff falling....

[eidsvold]

chloe - we did give our house a quick wipe over - it was horrid and ghekko poop needed washing away - literally j ust hosed front and back - as to the rest - yes we sweep everything else and use well below the suggested 140ltr a day.

[eidsvold]

i thought you could only wash house and car - no washing/hosing down concrete etc?!?!

[chloeb2002]

not totally sure what the permitted water usage was on the wet day but found the concpet here comical. only one of our neighbours took adanvtage of the wet hour but made it more of a wet day! i think everything in a 1km radius of tere place got a rinse! made me chuckle.....

[sandcastles]

chloeb2002, we are told to wash our house & keep the area around watered when possible...

Stops it drying out & cracking[and subsidance] of the foundations/structure due to the extreme weather conditions. [So we erer told]

[arfishy]

I don't think the drought is so bad in Sydney any more, we've had lots of rainfall (like all sodding "summer") and the dams are recovering. The water restrictions haven't lifted though.

If we run a bath (usually if we have 3 children to visit and we bung all 4 in) then the water gets saved for the plants. Otherwise we all shower.

Our front lawn looks shocking and the built in sprinklers have never been used.

It's been a good learning experience for us from the UK - DD hasn't known anything other than water restrictions and now I automatically think about it. Water shouldn't be wasted anywhere and now our habits are set.

I'm not sure about price changes, as I arrived mid-drought. I've certainly learned to buy local produce though, the price difference between local and imported is much more marked here than the UK.

[SueW]

You think you have it bad being asked to do a 4 minute shower?

According to the Daily Mail, Brits in the UK will be asked to keep their shower to 3 mins or under!

www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/showbiz/showbiznews.html?in_article_id=541211&in_page_id=177 3

[eidsvold]

i do find that hilarious - I get one 4 or 5 minute shower a week - to shampoo and shave. The rest of the week it is usually about 2 minutes - soap up, rinse and out as I usually have dd3 trying to get in with me and the other two dds fighting instead of getting ready for school.

[Jackaroo]

I'm wondering how much apples used to be in Melbourne - I've only been in Sydney a few weeks and all the apples are 4.99/5.99 a kilo - is this not normal???

Yep, it's been raining on and off since I got here, and the dams are up to 60 something %...

I did make it to Oz, btw, I was on here a lot before christmas, but then the move happened So far so good though...

Jackaroo

[Jackaroo]

I'm wondering how much apples used to be in Melbourne - I've only been in Sydney a few weeks and all the apples are 4.99/5.99 a kilo - is this not normal???

Yep, it's been raining on and off since I got here, and the dams are up to 60 something %...

I did make it to Oz, btw, I was on here a lot before christmas, but then the move happened So far so good though...

Jackaroo

[superloopy]

We have just had some lovely rain here in Melbourne, it is so nice!!!!!

It feels like to seasons are changing now and I'm ready for some cooler rainy weather. I'm in the mood for stews and soup!