Editor:
In times of crisis we realize that we’re all connected and this is such a time. With a fire raging and people pushed out of their homes, it’s time for the community to pull together. Being a good neighbour means not watering lawns, driveways, or non-essentials. Keeping a bowl in your sink to catch water from washing hands, veggies, fruit, etc., is enough to keep many potted plants alive. It quickly fills up and so does a bucket placed in the shower for the same purpose. Flushing every second or third time suffices and if you don’t have a low flow toilet, placing several bricks in the tank will help it become lower flow.
Teach children the importance of turning off the faucet while brushing teeth and filling containers carefully. For a few minutes extra time spent by each person we can save our water for essentials – like drinking and staying alive. Our recirculating pond from which birds and animals are drinking is kept clean by a mat of duckweed with little evaporation due to its shady location. We live in a beautiful environment with birds, fish and animals who, like us, depend on water, so any water saving helps them as Chapman Lake drains further.
With global warming, extreme weather patterns will be with us from now on, so conservation is the first priority. The second is to write to our premier and ask why we are subsidizing the fossil fuel LNG industry (they got the almost negligible royalties they asked for, not to mention the infrastructure we’re paying for) while the rest of the world is moving to renewables like solar, geothermal and wind.
Gayle Neilson, Gibsons
