rrigation System







The recent burst of hot weather has prompted the GS-C to put their combined heads together and come up with an idea to improve the garden watering.

We have decided the place to install our first irrigation system – yes, we have ambitions and ideas about installing others- will be under the balconies at the front of the building. We are going to combine a cleanup and revamp with the irrigation system. This is a garden area where, instead of plants which you might expect to find in a garden, bits of broken concrete and half bricks and rubbish have accumulated over the years. It has the neglected look of public housing where no one gives a damn about anything, much less a garden.

This morning with the help of David, the man who comes to tidy up path edges, generally clean up the garden area and trim back overhanging bushes each fortnight, we got stuck into things and carted away heaps of broken concrete and brick pieces and other rubbish The GS-C had already been around to their favourite hardware store and purchased a length of irrigation hose and organized the other bits that are needed to keep it in place. David did all the cutting and joining and we used a long hose connected to a garden tap to make sure it actually worked.

There were a few moments of heated debate about how the hose should be laid; with the outlets towards the ground or on the top. Finally the vote was two to one in favour of the outlets being on top and the job was finished. All that remains is to cut a short length of hose that will connect the tap to the end of the irrigation hose and we will be in business.

In theory now all I have to do on the allocated watering days is to get up bright and early, scamper down the stairs and turn on the tap and the watering will look after itself for an hour or so. A much better idea, in my opinion, than lugging heavy watering cans about first thing in the morning.

The next step in the beautification plan is to get a few bags of wood chips, put down some newspapers to suppress the weeds and maybe see what hardy plants we can coax to grow there.

Anything would be an improvement.