Put A Save-A-Flush Device In Your Cistern
Each flush of the toilet wastes 12 litres of water – but if you put a brick in your cistern you can save up to 3,000 litres a year, which is 35,000 cups of tea!
Special magic bricks called save-a-flush or hippos are offered free to customers by many water suppliers. Log onto your suppliers website and see if they provide them. If they do not, use the ‘contact us’ link to get in touch and ask them why they don’t.
And while you’re waiting for them to get with the action – either use a real brick – it has the same effect.
If your supplier allows you – Thames Water for example provides up to 100 free of charge – make a bulk order and give them out to your friends and neighbours or distribute them at church. (Jacqui, for example, has already received a hundred and is discreetly slipping them into cisterns across London. She has now ordered more under another name. We will keep you posted.)
Don’t forget to tell us if you do the action and let us know how many you have distributed.
Incidentally if you are changing your toilet check out dual flush toilets which give you the choice of a quick or long flush.
And if you want to know who you local water supplier is check here.
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GB , 15 Aug 2005
this is an easy thing to do assuming that you don’t have a closed cistern or a flush saving loo already. i sent off for 100 and distributed them at church
Midhurst, GB , 01 Sep 2005
Brought a load of “hogs” back from Greenbelt (thank you whoever lugged them there!)and then took most to school and they are now fitted to all the loos there.
04 Sep 2005
We were given a ‘hog’ at Greenbelt, and have put it in. It remains to be seen how it will cope with Genius Brat’s multiple wipes (he doesn’t like toilet paper).
What we really want is a proper dual flush, which means a new cistern – since Spouse™ is a plumber, this shouldn’t be difficult, except he’s usually out mending other people’s!
13 Sep 2005
Put bags in the cistern, but recently we gutted our shower room and the buildrrs put in a loo with 2 options (big or small flush). Kinda neat. Hope this saves water as there’s no now way I can take off the top and put anything in the cistern; it’s part of the wall!
07 Oct 2005
I’m another one using the “hog” I got at Greenbelt :)
11 Oct 2005
I also brought some back from Greenbelt and have put one in our cistern. I keep checking it, but I don’t know what I’m expecting it to be doing in there!! Gave the rest out to friends. Am currently trying to blag some more from somewhere. Any suggestions will be gratefully recieved :)
Chester, GB , 14 Oct 2005
I have just moved back into my house after a flood and have put the ‘hog’ in that I picked up at Greenbelt too. I want some more too to give out to my studnet, colleagues and the church
Leicester, GB , 31 Oct 2005
There was a pile of unwanted bricks outside the backdoor of my student abode… works perfectly :)
Richmond, GB , 08 Nov 2005
If you want to hand out some hogs, and you’re in the Thames water area , the nice people on the help desk (0845 9200 800) will sort you out with a bundle.
09 Nov 2005
I picked up ten hogs at greenbelt and visited the houses of family and friends to put them in their loos, as well as my own! Got some funny looks from relatives, though my friends are used to me!
06 Dec 2005
Brought a ‘hog’ back from Greenbelt but my loo is too narrow – need to find something else as real bricks would pull it off the wall…...
GB , 14 Dec 2005
be subversive – pop them into the loos at work!
09 Jan 2006
If only all the actions were this straightforward!
13 Jan 2006
When we had our bathroom done last year, we deliberately got a loo with a dual flush option and now only ever use the ‘half’ button. I will order the Save-a-Flush bricks from Thames Water (my local supplier) and give them out to everyone I know! I also like the idea of popping them subversively into work loos!
18 Jan 2006
Unfortunately our loo is a bit defective and we often have to flush it twice to get rid of ‘deposits’ so we can’t sign up for this one because it might make the flush even less effective.
Stroud, GB , 04 Feb 2006
I put one in our cistern – and when the plumber came to do something they removed it and did not put it back…. Now I have to get a replacement. Be warned, and keep an ey on them if you have to have them attend to your loos!
02 Mar 2006
Both toilets in my house have a dual flush option and all my kids have been told when to use each! :) Interesting conversation with a three year old! Think I will get these save a flush bricks and hand them out to folk – don’t think people appreciate how much water is lost each time you flush.
Cambridge, GB , 06 Mar 2006
I’ve just ordered my free device from: http://waterwise.fortune-cookie.com/home/
08 Apr 2006
Anglian water would only send me 2, I cound do with a couple more for the loos at work.
14 Apr 2006
I just ordered mine from Scottish water. I had no idea that these existed before I joined Generous, or that they were free. I’m going to tell lots of people ….
18 Apr 2006
I remembered bringing one of the free hippo things back from GB05, and recently decided to take it to church to tell people about it. I searched high and low but couldn’t find it anywhere.
Eventually the penny dropped – it was hiding in the loo cistern…
29 Apr 2006
I have ordered some from Thames Water – despite not being in their area! Bonus! Well, if they don’t come I shall just slip half a brick in there… don’t think they’d cope with a full brick.
GB , 05 May 2006
I put some ‘pigs’ in the cisterns at work a few months ago – checked today and they are still there (quietly saving water!)
20 May 2006
It appears that yorkshire water does not provide this facitity. i have contacted them asking for my water saving device for my cistern. i am awaiting their reply!!! watch this space….
25 May 2006
Anna/Andy my mum works for Yorkshire water and she said they do give the save a flush bags out (they expand to about the size of a brick when you put them in water. She said to phone 0845 124 24 24 and ask for one. If you don’t have any luck she said if you pass your details on she’ll post one out to you.
I’m in the Severn Trent area where I ordered mine from http://www.stwater.co.uk/server.php?show=nav.5795
06 Jul 2006
In case you don’t want to pay for a device and your water company doesn’t offer free ones, I’ve found that a plastic 1pint milk jug works just as well and of course you can always drink the milk.
09 Jul 2006
I’m doing what Jacqui did…I have ordered 100 and am going to give them out to students at college and anyone else I can think of…
12 Jul 2006
I am allowed to put them in the college cisterns! Lovely, there must be over 50!
Leicester, GB , 21 Jul 2006
The flat I have just moved into has an amazing dual flush thing which I was so happy to see I would have rented the flat on the strength of this one gadget – crazy sounding I know, but my partner and I have spent the past few months flat hunting in Leicester city centre and on all the new builds we saw, there is virtually no water-saving technology at all. For years people have been talking about grey water systems but planners just don’t factor them into their designs. Even more basic than that, in most cases there is no way of getting into the toilet cistern because it is built into the bathroom wall.
20 Aug 2006
I got my hippo free from Thames Water a couple of years ago but now you have made me think about it, I am going to get two more to give to my hubby to put in the cisterns in our new office.
22 Aug 2006
This is such an easy action to do in the area I live – very satisfying and I haven’t noticed any difference in flush quality!
22 Aug 2006
I also got my hog from Greenbelt, along with about 20 others which I’ve given to friends. Just wondering – do they last forever or do they need renewing?
Chatham, GB , 17 Sep 2006
Can anyone tell me how eco-friendly the chemicals inside the save-a-flush bags are? We just got one from our water supplier, but I’m assuming it’s the same kind of nasty chemicals which they put in disposable nappies to absorb the moisture ;-) I’m happy to improvise with a milk bottle or something as suggested above, but want to complain to the water people if they’re giving out nasties and need to be armed with facts!
Thanks!
18 Sep 2006
Have got them in all our cisterns. Our local water company (Anglia) also let me have another 50 of their “Freddy Frogs” which are basicaly one litre plastic bottles that you fill with sand. Have put an article in our parish magazine about saving water and have offered these to anyone who wants them.
Leeds, GB , 05 Oct 2006
I have just ordered some leaflets from Thames Water (even though it’s not my area) and have requested a flushsaver from Yorkshire Water (who are my area). I’m only temping in an office so feel a bit weird about mentioning their loos!
Cardiff, GB , 27 Nov 2006
you don’t even need a brick or a gadget – just bend the float arm so that the cistern doesn’t fill so far.
Reading, GB , 26 Jan 2007
Our upstairs loo hasn’t been flushed for two days! Not a deliberate action on my part, I might add; it broke. New flush bought. I’ll check out the brick thing.
Harrow, GB , 05 Mar 2007
Actually, I haven’t done this and don’t intend to – but instead I am pursuing the same policy that (apparently) Ken Livingstone pursues in his private life, which is summed up by the Aussies as:
If it’s brown, flush it down. If it’s yellow, let it mellow.
I can’t persuade the rest of my family to follow suit, but we do have a dual-flush cistern, so…
There is nothing unhygienic about pee – in fact, it has antiseptic properties – and it strikes me that if everyone observed the Aussie rule, the savings would be colossal.
Chesterfield, GB , 29 Mar 2007
Quite like the milk-carton-filled-with-water idea as those cartons are an eco-problem all of their own.
Gainsborough, GB , 12 May 2007
I’m in there with the milk carton idea in both my toilets. As I want to tell friedns to try the same thing I’ve called the two “facilities” if my house “Two Loos Low Wet”. Well, it’s a conversation starter!
Huddersfield, GB , 10 Sep 2007
YORKSHIRE WATER I have pledged to do this and sent off an email to Yorkshire water and they seem to provide freebies to help…..
http://www.yorkshirewater.com/becool/
17 Dec 2007
I’ve reused 2 plastic bottles filled with water for this, that would otherwise have gone to recycling (or maybe not, who knows what they do with them…). I can’t see the point in bringing extra ‘stuff’ into the house if there is an alternative there already.
Oxford, GB , 22 Feb 2008
To the people who have installed a brick in a dual flush loo – have you had any problems with things not fully, well, going?
I think it’s a great idea for normal-flush loos, and plan to install one in my normal-flush loo today. But my upstairs dual flush seems to be water saving enough already. The water saving is effectively already factored into the design…