Okay for a pre-wash, but unless you have a hose approved for drinking water, you'll still need to rinse thoroughly in your sink. Garden hoses leach some nasty things into the water and can harbor bacteria. You can still do that indoor-sink wash in a basin and use the water for potted plants or the flower bed right outside your door.

Somehow I doubt Martha is watering her own veggies, don't you?

What Rural and Rueful said!

This makes a pretty picture but is it really "simple" for your average gardener? Harvesting and washing food is a separate process for good reason. You want to wash your food --and wash it well -- with potable water. Even if I got a lead-free hose, I wouldn't trust an in situ rinse to wash away E. coli.

In Dane County, Wis., we had 3/10 of an inch of water in June. My rain barrels are bone dry and I've had to drag out the hose every week--for the first time in many years. Martha's idea is cute but it doesn't beat aqua cones/soda bottles or a drip irrigation system.

Running water over a lot of vegetables, greens especially, isn't particularly effective. I wash my veggies in a large bowl of tap water. Soil sinks to the bottom and any insects are drowned. That water goes on my houseplants or on the flower beds close to my house. (Or course my cat wants a drink out of it first. Yummy dirt and bug flavored water. :P)

Haha, I only read this post so I can read the comments, as I KNEW everyone would have something to say about the fact that you shouldn't use a hose to wash your food. What strange advice....

When I lived in Southern California we used the "grey water" from the dishes; we just had a tub in the sink and would carry it out the back door to the garden bed...we used castile soap (or other eco-friendly) and the plants never seemed to mind and miraculously we survived.

We water our (native but not edible) garden plants with H2O from the cat water bowls. We use several huge dog-sized bowls but change them every day so it would go to waste otherwise. We container grow on the porch and to be honest we don't really rinse our greens; most of the contamination comes from unclean hands and we wash ours before we handle the edible produce from our container gardens.

I think any water saving tip is a good idea and I especially appreciate advice that doesn't assume I'm a millionaire. I can't stand posts that say "just buy a rain barrel"! or "just buy solar panels!" While I would love to do both those things, I have to stick to creative conservation because we're not made of money.

Since when is hose water so terrible for you? Did no one else grow up drinking water from the hose because they didn't want to go inside? I think this is a pretty good idea!

My hose is specifically marked "not for drinking water".

I am with Potterychick and DramaBB82! Didn't we ALL grow up drinking from the backyard hose?! Or spraying each other with the hose & of course drinking it all in?! My goodness, here we have another version of "Pebbles as Tripping Hazards" at work! We had so much fun as kids how did y'all turn into a generation of crabby parents who think everything is an allergen or hidden danger and a lawsuit in the making?!?! If a garden hose is marked "not for drinking water" then one should not be watering their veggie garden with it! Yes, washing off veggies with a hose in a colander over the garden may be a bit impractical. However, the water coming out of the hose isn't gonna kill you! If you can water your garden with the same water (that has been treated with both chlorine AND ammonia at the waste treatment plant!) coming out of the same hose, then squirting them off in a colander with the same water and hose isn't gonna kill ya! Sheeesh! Or you can rinse your veggies in a dish pan at the kitchen tap (it's the same water that goes through the garden hose!) and pour that into the garden. Grey water is how my compost garden thrives here in the dry south west. And even though, because of the fires and the drought, we are more conservative with the water use than normal, hubby and I still run through the yard occasionally spaying ourselves down with the garden hose and drinking from it like the little kids we still are at heart. And the garden gets a drenching at the same time. And it hasn't killed us. Actually makes us stronger together.

I'm sure the lawyers are responsible for the "not for drinking water" labels on hoses. I've been drinking hose water for a long time with no ill effects.

I'm with Ecuadoriana1. The world needs lots of happy, strong people. Enough of sterility. It makes people snarky.

Although I might have a bit of trouble spaying myself with a hose. Outside. In the garden. Hehe. ;o)

In Australia we have (up until very recently) had several years of drought. Watering gardens is done with grey water (for non-edibles) and excess cooking water where possible for edibles. Most people don't have hoses and trigger nozzles were in line with the water restriction to avoid wastage. We flush our toilet with grey water (bucket in the shower/from washing machine) to save clean water for the garden.

Can I also add, that the garden in the pic would really benefit from some mulch-peastraw, sugar cane mulch etc. Mulching helps avoid water evaporation from the soil.
cheers
Cate

@ greenrenters- I've been doing the same this with the shower water (using it to flush toilet) for as long as I can remember. That's what we did with the bath water when I was growing up in Ecuador. We also caught water in barrels from drain spouts that came off the roof directly into the bathroom (either through the window or a hole cut into the wall). I spent some time in Adelaide years ago & the people I stayed with used the "bucket in the shower" system for flushing the toilet. So happy to see that other people are aboard the train! We do not need to be using gallons of fresh clean water to flush the toilet! We need fresh clean water for drinking. Priorities!!! Thanks greenrenters for helping spread the word!

good grief why is everyone freaking out??? where i live (asia) no water is safe to drink except bottles. so, i have to wash all my stuff & then rinse that with drinking water. so, just treat this as a pre rinse. yeesh! it's very clever.

Well one could just keep a bowl in the sink and let all of the rinsing water go into that, then take that outdoors. And it could hold a lot more than just the rinsing water from the vegetables.. even dishwashing water is fine in my opinion.

Lead poisoning (the primary risk from drinking from hoses) was not considered a huge hazard until recently. The risk you are under from it depends on what your overall exposure is, but considering how hard it can be to know what level of lead you are being exposed to, and some of the effects of lead poisoning, I would not want to risk it. Heavy metal poisoning is not a "pebble tripping hazard." It happens all the time to people who live perfectly ordinary lives and just happen to live in a place with super-high lead. Like older neighborhoods where people do a lot of gardening: lead from paint dust gets in the soil, people eat food grown in the soil. And the acceptable lead exposure is being adjusted downward all the time.

Also, this tip doesn't save you much water; using a hose requires that you fill the entire length of the hose with water. I use far less water by rinsing my vegetables in a bowl in the sink, and I can use that water in the garden just as easily.