As Orange's gardeners face the certainty of level five water restrictions, the gardeners in this year's Millthorpe Garden Ramble are making the most of recent spring rains and only being on level three restrictions.
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Millthorpe is part of the Central Tablelands Water network that is supplied from Lake Rowlands, which is currently at 60 per cent.
Gardeners are restricted to three hours in the morning and evening using the odds and evens system.
Garden Ramble Committee president Lyndall Harrison said most of the gardens are looking great thanks to recent rains, however the next four weeks means that for the gardeners in town, they'll need to keep an eye on their plants.
"We've been very fortunate that we had the good September rain following on from the snow in early August," she said.
Recent downpours have also topped up watertanks and helped freshen new and established plantings.
"If the Ramble was this weekend I don't think that they would have noticed much."
Many of the ramble gardens are on blocks of land just out of town and depend on their own water supplies, and Mrs Harrison said this year there will be a strong focus on water saving strategies.
"Most people that are coming are very understanding and aware of what the situation is at the moment and how difficult it's been,' she said.
"A lot of people are mulching a lot more than they maybe used to and will be presenting the ways that they're preserving their gardens with focused watering."
Mark Logan
Started working in newspapers in the 1990's in the darkroom of the Pastoral Times in Deniliquin before moving to Millthorpe in 2003. Soon after arriving I started as a photographer at the CWD. Now a journalist at the Blayney Chronicle.
Started working in newspapers in the 1990's in the darkroom of the Pastoral Times in Deniliquin before moving to Millthorpe in 2003. Soon after arriving I started as a photographer at the CWD. Now a journalist at the Blayney Chronicle.
