California - What are you doing this month?

I finished caulking 4 beds today. The silicon I was using was taking forever. Husband got me a large tube for the caulking gun and it was marginally better. My hands were taking a beating squeezing the tubes and the gun. He bought a different type of silicon and it was a breeze. Wish I had been using the product all along. Only 7 beds to go! When I watered the finished beds, it was a success. The water didn't run out of the seams, only out the drainage holes after a while. This should really help during the summer for conservation.

Tomorrow for sure, I will plant some of the Cole seedlings and the pea seeds. The trellises can wait until the peas need them. I wonder if husband wants to make me just one more little TT? 4' x 2.5-3'. If he does I will have him move the 1' x 4' over by the house for winter bok choy / radishes and summer petunias.

Just when the garden was starting to come back to life, here came the triple-digits again. 104.5 yesterday and it's already 102.5 today and still climbing. 

I just cut the water off to my tomatoes after getting a $445 water bill (tiered pricing sucks) but the peppers are going strong, and I'll keep them around longer. I'm checking all the emitters around the landscaping to make sure the varmints didn't chew any more drip lines and contribute to my pain. Just discovered that the neighbor's gophers are starting to invade, and there are signs that the rats are sending out scouts, so I'm setting out traps. Wish me luck!

OMG... on all accounts!

Are your water bills yearly?

CC,  You're so cute!  YS pays through the nose for water because of the small private water company serving his area.  I think that is monthly!

YS, How many gallons did you use for that water bill?

Yardslave wrote: I just cut the water off to my tomatoes after getting a $445 water bill (tiered pricing sucks) but the peppers are going strong, and I'll keep them around longer. I'm checking all the emitters around the landscaping to make sure the varmints didn't chew any more drip lines and contribute to my pain. Just discovered that the neighbor's gophers are starting to invade, and there are signs that the rats are sending out scouts, so I'm setting out traps. Wish me luck!

LUCK!  The good kind!

CapeCoddess wrote:OMG... on all accounts!

Are your water bills yearly?

Out west, water is $$$$$$

My water bills are monthly, payment goes to a corporation (CalAm) that posted a 34% profit last year, and is currently asking the state for a 50% increase in water cost for rate payers to offset our 35% reduction in water use that we users did in compliance with a statewide mandate to reduce water use. 2 years ago the corporation got approval to double the cost of water and got it! Now they want more.

Yikes Yardslave ... are they selling you liquid gold? I feel for you. That is terrible.

We get billed every two months. The bill includes charges for water, sewer surcharge and fire supply. The sewer surcharge is the biggest chunk, followed by water and then fire supply (which I assume is for the fire hydrants but I'm not sure). The water supply is owned and billed by the City of Ottawa.

From June 16 to August 16 we were charged $54 for water, $63 for sewer and $7 for fire supply for a total of $124. The two months prior to that was $130 and prior to that $91. So for 6 months the total bill was $345.  Taking out the sewer and fire charges the total over that six period for water alone was $140 (or $280 on an annual basis).

Keep in mind that those are Canadian dollars which are only worth about 75 cents in US dollars.

Yardslave wrote:I just cut the water off to my tomatoes after getting a $445 water bill (tiered pricing sucks) but the peppers are going strong, and I'll keep them around longer. I'm checking all the emitters around the landscaping to make sure the varmints didn't chew any more drip lines and contribute to my pain. Just discovered that the neighbor's gophers are starting to invade, and there are signs that the rats are sending out scouts, so I'm setting out traps. Wish me luck!

YIKES! I thought tiered pricing was in violation of our state laws and they had to stop. Even our electric bill wasn't that high this year and Hubby is a watering fool!

The ruling was against public water companies. The tiered pricing can be used by private water companies.

Tiered water rates can still be used by Public water agencies after the ruling, it's supposedly a little bit harder.  The agencies are supposed to provide water on the basis of the cost of providing it.

Which Cal-Am water district?  Monterey service area?  That seems to be the odd one out, looks like much of Cal-Am provides at around $1/CGL.  far cheaper than my public agency and far cheaper than San Diego at $10/HCF (HCF =7.8 CGL)

Monterey is a different story.  Their rate schedule still has one of those x customer allotment things on it which makes knowing pricing a PITA.  They're at $6.47/CGL for over 299 CGL x allotment.  Allotment is done by number of people in the house, size of property, property usage, etc.

How much water did you use?   Monterey is tiered in 10 HCF increments (74.8 CGL), the third tier is $2.58/CGL  The fourth at $5.175.


Just trying to be helpful and not accusatory.  Keep in mind, even if you have 200 SF of beds and put a inch  of water on them a day, that comes out to 37.4 CGL.

Thanks, No_Such. I guess I should just smile at my $132 water bill and move on. They should start moving downward from here on, since the triple-digits-water-3x-a-day season is gone until next year (I hope).

San Diego has it pretty bad too- their annual water fees are about $116 higher annually (on average) than Monterey's. This is according to the Wall Street Journal's research. I Have just shy of 700 square feet of raised beds, of which I have only planted 1/4 of the beds to conserve water- the rest goes to water 1/2 acre of fruit trees, and minimal landscaping. My gardens are on life support.

Ouch, you're screwed.  :-)  Although I'm envious of having 700 SF of beds.  I barely have 40.  That fifth tier they have is ugly, really ugly, granted it kicks in at 40 HCF, but it's the equivalent of $48/HCF.  Even tier three is $35/HCF.  And with any appreciable land HCF burn up quickly.  

Our water billing in Cali is getting driven towards the expected usage of an apartment dweller, anything above that and the water consumption gets prohibitive quickly.

IMHO, it's sad watching urbanites yacking about water conservation and farmers and basically being clueless at how much water use is sitting on their plate.

The only answer for me has been deep mulching.  It is adding so much more organic material to my soil that it holds the water longer and also research shows that deep mulching and high organic matter levels recharges wells at a much higher rate. 

I'm not on city water, but I do pay electricity on pumping the water and that does go up appreciably in the summer so we try to be careful.  Thank God I'm not on city water - I can't tell you how many times I left a sprinkler on all night this summer

For the month of August, we used 10,300 gallons at a cost of $31.43.  Average household use was 20,883 gallons!!  Our Stage 3 Water Allocation is 8,347 gallons, so we are getting really good at conserving.

Today is a really nice working day with max temp of 75*F expected.  I hate to pull the peppers but the winter starts need to go in.    Yesterday's harvest:

Audrey,  These are your walking onions!  I separated them yesterday and they are still alive!!

This weather is delightful.  I got another box amended for some herbs/poppy seed starts.

The pepper box is the next one to rip up  and plant with winter starts. The Butternuts are doing great!

Yay!!!  They look beautiful.  I'm going away and hopefully my garden will be here when I get back.  If not, oh well, end of season anyway

Nice!  Love your beginning to our end!

Audrey, I thought you had some starts for winter veggies??

SR, You get to rest, we have to keep on trucking.

I do have my fall crop mostly planted - hopefully it survives my absence.  I've never left my garden that long.  I'm not going to sweat it though, I haven't seen my sister in about 10 years.  We have a lot of catching up to do!

Oh, wow, enjoy yourselves!

Yea, my next water bill is going to take a beating.  Turned on the drip irrigation and the main supply line blew out.  Basically had a raw 3/4 inch irrigation pipe running for 4 hours.  Nice big pond in the low spot of the yard.

At least the orange tree got a deep watering.  Now when the heat wave starts up tomorrow, every orange on the tree can split.

Triple digits today. We were supposed to be done with all that. Grrrrrr! My garden has stopped dead again.