Last week we took a look at five easy ways to conserve water at home, and you guys had some amazing tips to add. So amazing, in fact, that we thought we'd share some of them right here!

One commenter said:

We have pasta a few times a week and the water from boiling the pasta used to go down the drain. Now we hold onto the water and use it to rinse out recyclable containers or to pre-rinse dishes.

He suggests using either an in-pot strainer or seating your colander over a larger pot to collect the water. Just be careful not to burn yourself! Pot holders are your friend.

Candace has a great tip for encouraging the kiddos to take shorter showers:

With two young kids, getting them to take short showers has been a fight. We bought a kitchen timer and set it. They get a two minute warning and then they have to be out by the time the timer goes off. We make a game out of it to entice them to get out of the shower fast.

We know that eating meat has a big environmental impact, and dinesh points out that meat's water footprint is nothing to sneeze at, either:

I’d like to throw on 1 more which is perhaps a bit alternative, but actually really simple and has the potential for a really really big impact.

Eating less meat.

I know the statistic varies a bit depending on who you talk to, but it’s something like… “it takes 500 – 2,500 gallons of water to make 1 pound of beef.”

The first time I heard this I was completely shocked. Instituting something like a ‘vegetarian night’ would probably be pretty easy for most households. Especially because there are so many great faux-meat options out there these days for meat eaters who are trying to cut back.

Eating even just 1/2 a lb less of beef once a week saves at least 250 gallons of water. That’s a lot.

Thanks for adding such great suggestions, you guys! The discussion was so good, we'd love to keep it going, so we hope you'll share your water-saving tips here in the comments.

Image Credit: Creative Commons photo by botter