How much vinegar mixture do you use in the rinse?

And no Borax in the laundry soap?

tj

no borax, i figure if its poisonous to the earth its poisonous to my babes. umm 2 gal vinegar. in my rinse also.

which i also use 1/2 scoop of the vinegar so it has 1/2 cup vinegar and little baking soda in it.

Yes, Borax (boron compound) would be easy to overdo in a garden. I'm certainly no expert, but diluted as it is, it looks relatively harmless. How big of an area would this be going on and how many loads per week?

tj

i believe that the area would be about 80' by 150' altogether. i do about 12 loads a week sometimes 15.

How much water does a washing cycle use? How much water does a rinse cycle use? 2 gallons of vinegar in the rinse is an awful lot.
What would happen to your soil depends on the dilution and how often you applied that, but that amount every week could pose potential harm to the soil in that space. Spread over a bigger area it probably would not be as harmful.

i make that all in a 200 oz container then use about 1/2 cup per load, i think it uses 20 gal per load. its one of those stackable washer/dryer things. not very watersaving i've noticed. so they would get altogether 15 cups of vinegar a week, in 300 gal of water? i think.

I see a pH issue happening with regular doses of vinegar.

By the way, some of the chemicals that are used to make synthetic fragrances are quite toxic. Fabric softeners, such as Downey, should be avoided by anyone who is concerned about the introduction of potentially dangerous chemical into their home and environment. Best to go entirely fragrance free or find a good source of natural botanical scents.

dunno if i can help much, but i would certainly try it on the lawn first in yor instance.

just for comparrison purposes check out the recipe for laundry gel on our remedies page, we use this exclusively and we water our potted plants and gardens with it and no side effects.

in app' 40 litres of rinse water we us about a cupfull or 2 of vinegar so there is enough for rinse aid but not too much as to ahve an effect o nur plants. we also use rainwater for washing as it is softer than town water.

you do a lot of washing.

len

Here is a link that might be useful: len's garden page

ok i'll check it out, i use this one because these guys have very sensitive skin, the others i have tried makes their skin itch to much. imagine that!! LOL that's the reason in the first place i went to making my own soap, LOL thank you so much :'))

I'm not all that sure that you would use 20 gallons of water per load, maybe 5, but still think of the dilution. 1/2 cup of that in 5 gallons of water is how much total? Not a lot in one load but spread over several loads that may be a lot more water than you would want to put in that garden in one week, 10 loads x 5 gallons of water is a lot of water in a small area and 10 loads x 20 gallons is a lot more and that could make that bed a swamp, not a good growing medium.

Hello y'all, We had an awful drought a few summers ago, worst in 50 yrs., and the only thing that kept our garden from frying to a crisp was greywater from our laundry.[which needs to be used immediately,BTW.] Other people's wells were drying up, and our town had banned watering, so we were very, very thankful for the greywater. I used a natural, biocompatible soap, which I believe the plants liked; it seemed to help them handle the stress better. I occasionally added some vinegar, but not every time, skipped the fabric softener; as humid as our summers are, it's not needed. Some companies sell an all natural fabric conditioner, which BTW is also better for your laundry. [Conventional fabric softeners, especially when used excessively, will weaken fibers, and turn whites a dull gray color. Lavender oil gives laundry a nice scent, and is natural.] Sounds like you do a lot of laundry; I can relate to that! Perhaps someone has a recipe for biocompatible homemade laundry soap? Would like to have that myself! Best wishes for your endeavers......

you could of course look at another option if you think the grey water is going to do harm?? that is use that water to flush the toilet by using buckets, this way you save using good fresh clean drinking water for that inefficient job. and then the good water saved could then go to the gardens, also use buckets in the shower or bale out the bath water for the garden, often this water not as bad as laundry water depending on detergent used of course.

but we find that gel we make and use very good on both cleaning clothes and watering the vege gardens and pot plants. try to use all water at least twice.

len

i did look at your website len WOW!!! of course i marked it!! i do love the garden idea. i have tried the lavender oil in my softner, the only reason i'm using the fabric softner right now is mom gave it to me, so i'm using it at a cup per 2 gal of vinegar(in which i use only 1/2 cup per load) so as to give it some smell but not enough to mess up my clothes (hopefully!! LOL) and make these guys itch!! LOL
once that's all used up i'm going back to the lavender oil. i LOVE that stuff, mom gave me lavender downy. downy and fabric softners in your wash are bad on your lint trap, if you don't rinse your lint trap, it will not let the air pass thru and cause a house fire. so check your lint trap, pull it out, put it under the running water, if the water runs over and not thru it, use dawn (or the likes)liquid dish soap (it helps) to wash it, check it again, if the water runs thru it, dry it and put it back.

I think Gardenlen's suggestion is a good one, using laundry water for toilet bowls. A small solar pump and tank on the roof would allow you to avoid the buckets (and sloshing) of a by-hand tank filling.

In my experience, it's easier to use shower water for garden irrigation - it's more dilute. I seldom use much shampoo and I never saw any salt/residue problems. It was more work to isolate that one drain line and plumb it to a Y with a directional flow that allowed me to send it down the drain if there was some reason (like excessive rain) that I didn't want the flow to the garden.

What about grey water from the kitchen? I am putting in a summer kitchen and I want to plumb the sink to water the border plantings in the yard. I know that dish soap is often used for pest control. What would be the long-term effect of watering with soapy water? I expect some fats and food particles will find their way down the drain as well. Would this have any effect on the garden other than possibly attracting animals? Does anyone know of any techniques to filter this out?

we use our dishwater on the garden, we use that earth friendly detergent, and very little of it a teaspoon full or less in 10 to 15 litres of water, as we use rainwater for dishwashing not much detergent is needed.

we wash our dishes each 2nd or 3rd day, so things get rinsed off and this rinse water (value added) goes to watering vege' plants in particular and generally mixed with my wee water (we also rinse into this water all food cans we open including milk containers it all adds), once we have created a couple or so litres of rinse water we no longer need to run the tap. pre-rinsing dishes still makes good water management as we need water for the plants.

we wash dishes by hand in a plastic basin that fits into the sink neatly, so it makes it easy to tote the water to the garden. that gel recipe can also be used for dish washing just it doesn't suds up.

len

Here is a link that might be useful: len's garden page