Extreme drought conditions and the likelihood of another challenging fire season have prompted a community in one of the driest parts of the province to start managing its water supply early — and turning off the taps for people who don’t follow the rules.

The City of Merritt has announced water restrictions — that the mayor says wouldn’t usually be considered until mid-July — in an effort to conserve water ahead of wildfire season and get people in the habit of using less.

Level 3 watering restrictions are in effect, limiting lawn and garden watering to two times per week, on designated days depending on numbered addresses. Hand watering and washing is allowed any time.

Mayor Michael Goetz said he’s anxious about the months ahead, knowing the snowpack is the lowest ever recorded at this time of year.

  • @dlpkl
    28•5 months ago

    Why the fuck do they have lawns in the first place? You live in as close to a desert as Canada has, lay out some gravel, throw a cactus or two in, and call it a day.

    • @[email protected]
      13•5 months ago

      There’s no need to water a lawn even if you “need” one. There’s nothing wrong with brown grass, it’ll change back once it rains.

      • @Boxtifer
        9•5 months ago

        Gravel is fine for them. Pets and kidshumans adapt

      • @[email protected]English
        6•5 months ago

        Gravel and cactus is maybe an exaggeration, but I expect there’s some kind of native groundcover that would be Good Enough. Or set up a buried greywater irrigation system if you really must have that lawn of imported green grass. Or take the kids and pets to the park to play, like apartment-dwellers do. Or just, y’know, suck it up during the bad years and accept you’re going to have a brown lawn from time to time. The ridiculously wasteful setup that exists in most suburbs, where people baby along vast tracts of climate-inappropriate grass cultivars, should never have existed.

        • @[email protected]English
          0•5 months ago

          I didn’t say lawn. When did I say lawn?

          A non lawn ground cover that is soft is what I’m saying many families want.

          • @[email protected]English
            2•5 months ago

            You’re correct: in all fairness, it wasn’t you, specifically, who used the word “lawn”, and I could have chosen somewhere else to slip my reply into the subthread.

      • @dlpkl
        3•5 months ago

        Around my area on the west coast we get a lot of artificial turf lawns. Best of both worlds if you can shell out 5-10k.