By: Kim Mckay and Jenny Bonnin
Are you maximising your garden's ability to capture precious rainfall?
Roofs, roads, driveways, footpaths and other water-resistant surfaces stop rainfall from being absorbed into the ground, where it can be used by plants and filtered by the soil before entering the water table.
Instead, the run-off flows, untreated, down drains, from where it is dumped directly into waterways, flooding the ecosystem with chemicals and other pollutants. The amount of water lost down a stormwater drain is many times that used in the average garden.
But you can lessen this loss by minimising paved areas and using permeable pavers or paving designs that allow rainwater to run through. Don't use sheets of plastic under your pavers or gravel or you'll defeat all your hard work.
Also, you can make a feature of the contours in your garden by landscaping for water efficiency. Make the most of water running off sloping, rocky and paved areas by bordering them with plant beds to absorb the water.
Create depressions or ponds where water can collect to seep back into the ground and replenish the water table, rather than having it go straight down the stormwater drain.
A permanent pond is a valuable addition to a garden ecosystem, and will attract native animals, such as birds and frogs. With the right plantings it will provide a habitat for native fish, which in turn will eat mosquitoes, other insects and algae.
BABY STEPS
Our ecological footprint is simply the amount of land and water resources we use in our daily lives compared to the earth's capacity to regenerate.
Our footprint is made up of how much land is required to make the food we eat, the house we live in, how much we travel, the amount of stuff we buy and how much energy we use.
To tackle global warming and climate change, we all need to reduce our ecological footprints. This week is the first Zero Footprint Week, which is a good time to think about how you can reduce the amount of resources you use every day.
The week will focus on what we need to do at home, in the office, at the farm and on holidays to reduce our footprints.
It's fun to find out your footprint: find a wide range of footprint-measuring tools at the NSW Government's website, www.livingthing.net.au/RC_Tool.htm and at the ACF Green Home program, www.acfonline.org.au. For more details on what you can do during Zero Footprint Week visit www.oneatatimefoundation.org.au