Water Waster! Water Waster!

When I was growing up, my older sister and I would relentlessly tease my younger brother about wasting water.  He would let the faucet run while brushing his teeth or while doing the dishes or would take long showers.  And we were probably harsh about it.

Now, I guess he can start chanting “water waster” at me.

The other day my family and I were out in the garden. I was harvesting lettuce (a huge batch!) and my husband was feeding the fish and topping off the sump tank.

And then we went inside.  Without turning off the hose.  I didn’t notice the flooding…all…day…long.

22 hours after we were in the garden last I noticed out the window that the pump wasn’t running. Upon investigation I realized our grave error.  The pump cord had been sitting in water and eventually shorted out. Luckily it had just tripped a breaker and we were able to still use the pump after resetting everything.

Our full day of the hose running had completely flushed our system.  Completely!  Since the hose water was running into the sump, the sump pumped all the hose water into the fish tanks and all the good fishy water flowed into the garden beds and back into the sump where it then overflowed the edges.

I was very relieved to see that our Tilapia had survived the system flush but our poor Koi couldn’t handle the transition.

Fish are very particular about their water.  High fluctuations in the pH levels can be deadly for them.  And so it was.  We unceremoniously dumped the Koi into the garbage, but we were very sad to do so.

So, a word of warning- don’t abandon your sump tank while the hose is running.  If you do, be aware that you could lose all your fish.  And you’ll have a super high water bill to boot…