We lost 7 million litres of water in 2 years. Can our homestead survive this?

Our dams just ran dry, two months earlier than we predicted. With El Nino locking in across Australia and the chance of significant rain next to nothing, our homestead water crisis is now the biggest problem we're facing in 2026. We've got a bore on site, but at 1,500mg of salt per litre, it's been quietly killing our gardens for years. So we did what any homesteader in this situation has to do, we looked at every option, costed them all honestly, and made the smartest decision we could with the time and money we actually have. This is the reality of running an off grid homestead in a drought-affected part of Queensland. The bore water is too salty for the vegetable garden. The dam is empty for the first time in two years. And we're heading into another long dry season with no guarantee of when meaningful rain returns. If you've ever wondered what happens when your primary water system fails on an off grid property, this is it, the full reasoning process, the numbers, and the interim water solution we've landed on. We looked into magnets, trucking water in, drilling another bore, and just letting the gardens go. What we landed on is a water carting setup built around a donated trailer, an IBC tank, and a firefighting pump. It costs almost nothing to run, buys us time to implement a permanent fix, and does double duty as something we're going to need badly heading into bushfire season. This is the honest story of what happens when your primary water system fails, and how you keep moving forward anyway. Check out the Elite300 from Bluetti: https://www.bluettipower.com.au/produ... ————— CONNECT WITH US Rustic Spirits Email List: https://bit.ly/rustic_spirits_email_list Check out our Patreon and join the Rustic Spirits Community:   / rusticspiritsco   ————— The Rustic Spirits Podcast    / @rusticspiritspodcast