Set sprinklers to water the lawn or garden only - not the street or sidewalk.
Use the microwave to cook small meals. (It uses less power than an oven.)
Purchase "Green Power" for your home's electricity. (Contact your power supplier to see where and if it is available.)
Scrape, rather than rinse, dishes before loading into the dishwasher; wash only full loads.
Cut back on air conditioning and heating use if you can.
Turn off appliances and lights when you leave the room.
VIRGINIA BEACH -- The rain that falls from the sky provides most of our fresh water.
When we get too much too quickly, the ground can't absorb it and that runoff can actually harm the environment.
“It does because none of it is filtered, so all of the pollutants that run off go directly back into our waters," explains Laurie Fox, a horticulture associate with Virginia Tech.
Fox and her associates created a rain garden to show what you can do to better manage storm runoff on your property.
"It collects runoff from your impervious surfaces, holds the water temporarily, uses the soil and the plants to filter it, so that it is cleaner as it goes back into the ground and recharges the aquifer," she notes.
To start your own rain garden, look around the outside of your home. See how much runoff comes from surfaces that don’t absorb water – like pavement, the roof and other items. That will determine how big it needs to be. Then, determine where your rain garden should be situated and the kind of plants you want in it. The more varieties you have, the more the storm water gets filtered.
Create a low area, basically a place for a puddle to collect. By lining the low area with layers of sand, soil, mulch, rocks, and plants, you’ll control the how the water will run into your garden and how it is absorbed.
No matter how you construct your rain garden, make sure that the water can be absorbed into the ground in a reasonable amount of time – a day or two and no longer than four days; any longer than that, the garden will become a breeding place for mosquitoes.
