about the drought

1. watering trees in a drought.
Drill a hole with a hand auger or post hole borer to a depth of about 500 mm at around the drip line (where water drips off the leaves) insert a plastic pipe into the hole. Fill the pipe with with water once a week.

2. take baths not showers and bucket the water out onto the garden after use. If you have no bath keep a bucket in the shower to catch water as you shower.
a portable hand basin where you wash hands will save you heaps of water. Fill the hand basin with water once a day and use the same water each time you wash.

3. set up diversion valves on your laundry and or shower bath vanity exits.



Any kind of container can be used to catch water from downpipes and rainwater guttering if it does happen to rain. It doesnt need to be a big barrel just a bucket will do.

One of the largest consumers of water is the toilet cistern. Depending on the size of the cistern a brick (or half a brick) in the cistern will save you a litre or so of water each flush.
Remember - If its yellow let it mellow, if its brown flush it down.

showering. get wet, turn the shower off, soap up all over, turn shower on. rinse off.

I was thinking that, should they fall, they're shorter and maybe won't fall on anything important?

The 10 gallons of collected water each time you shower would go a long way toward helping the trees survive.

Agree with all of dad's recommendations.

Good advice. I don't know how much a pine tree drinks per day, but it would seem that the gray water from a house could go a long way towards satisfying even the minimal requirements to keep a tree alive.

Aaaack re topping trees.

Me too.

Grey water is the term used for bath kitchen and laundry exit water. Black water is exit water from your your toilet system.
Dont attempt to store grey water for more than 24 hours edgar it goes bad realyy quickly.
There is quite a bit of solid matter contained in grey water - skin scales, hair and fabric fibres as well as body oils and salts. It's actually fantastic fertiliser which breaks down really quickly once in contact with soil ( no smell)
Run grey water through gravity fed pipes directly on to the garden. We found we needed a 50 mm pipe to allow enough flow otherwise the water backed up and took ages to drain away. We found it best to have a moblie end pipe of around 10 meters so the hose can be shifted around the garden and not deposit all the grey matter in one place.

Our large desert ash lived through quite comfortably on just the weekly laundry water. Neighbours trees on both sides died.

Being the practical man you are edgar you could potentially make some money setting up grey water diversions for neighbours nad friends.

Bad idea?

I'm interested in the tap roots of the trees - since they are probably deep and important in the trees' standing firm. Shallow roots are important too, like spreading your feet. What I'm not clear on, is if the tap and the surrounding roots should be watered differently in a drought situation, as in slow and steady for tap and more often with shorter time for the shallow, which may be exposed to more sun and wind.

Dang it dadpad. Now I've got to translate mm to inches.

That's some practical advise, dadpad. I will see how much of it I can put to use around here.

Most trees dont have an actual tap root osso. Roots spread out horizontaly and form a mat under the soil.
Main roots (the thick ones are generaly located in the top couple of feet of soil. Feeder roots come off the main roots and are usualy located in the top 6 inches. The main roots dont absorb much water their primary purpouse is carrying water to the tree and stabilising the whole structure.
The purpouse of watering slowy is to allow the soil to absorb as much water as possible.

50 mm = 2 inch
25 mm = 1 inch
Round about is close enough.

50 millimeter = 1.968 503 937 inch
10 meter = 32.808 398 95 feet

In my view it is both not useful and a poor idea for the form of the trees.

Trees are topped all the time - when the wrong choice was made in selecting trees to go under wires, when people want to pollard trees (gah!), and other reasons re fruit trees, but for the average tree there is a lot to be said for natural growth form with thoughtful pruning if done.

We had 4 years of stage 4 water restrictions. No car washing, no garden watering. Basically no external use of mains water.
I know one couple who's goal was to use their water 3 times before it exited the property.
They were on tank water and septic tank. one bath for the whole family. Bath water was used flush the toilet then pumped out of the septic onto the garden.
Lots of people round here sank bores and mystical water diviners were in high demand.
Its surprising how much water is available at 6o or 100 feet even in a drought.

The Houston area has such a huge population, we are using up the water pretty fast, even in good times.

Well, pines do; how much pines vary I don't know. Look at my link earlier, it notes pines as an exception.

Very bad idea for pine trees.
The confiers will die if all green branches are removed. full stop. no question about it.
Edgar
If you do decide to remove trees it can be done by blocking down. No need to try to fall the whole tree in one go. Remove small sections say 2 or 3 feet at a time. You might find hiring a high lift tower and doing the work yourself suitable for that but I'm not sure what restrictions might be in place for working at heights.