Hey everyone,

I have had to split this poll into two threads as the maximum allowed poll options is 10. the details of the poll can be found he

http://www.gardenbanter.co.uk/united...tml#post948612

If you could be so kind as to vote in both to give me a good overall picture of how much time you spend in your garden with things such as a water feature running or lights switched on (during the evening) that would be great!

Once again thank you for any help

A few thoughts for your research.

Firstly - it's very confusing as to what you're actually after. I think you're after the potential for solar lights or solar water features. In which case, don't you want to know the total usage of these features, irrespective of whether the gardener is in the garden at the time?

secondly, you could do with a little more time considering your target audience for this questionnaire. Most people on uk.rec. gardening are keen gardeners - we spend a lot more time growing plants that we do lounging around admiring our water features. So compared with the UK garden-using population, we're a pretty biased sample!

And that bring me to the third point - if you'd read the information on gardenbanter, you would see that it is merely a portal for usenet - ie it forwards posts, in this case, to the newsgroup uk.rec.gardening and retrieves answers from that group. Most of the people who would be likely to answer your questionnaire are posting directly to e.rec.gardening - they won't even see your poll! (Yes, I know you've given the url, but people won't come across from urg and register with gardenbanter just to add to your poll._

tommy060289 wrote:
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Question: How much time do you spend in your garden in the Week

- Weekday (day time) - 0-2 hours
- Weekday (day time) - 2-5 hours
- Weekday (day time) - 5-8 hours
- Weekday (day time) - 8-10 hours
- Weekday (day time) - 10+ hours
- Weekday (day time) - 0-2 hours
- Weekday (day time) - 2-5 hours
- Weekday (day time) - 5-8 hours
- Weekday (day time) - 8-10 hours
- Weekday (day time) - 10+ hours
------------------------------------------------------------------------

Are some of those meant to say 'weekend'?

They do say weekend in this poll, its because there is two polls running.

and kay, sorry for any confusion caused - I'm basically after the time people spend in the garden where they are running a feature like a water feature or some lighting. The two polls should allow me to see roughly where people spend the time (daytime vs evening and weekday vs weekend) and how much time they spend during these times.

I agree with you that the poll has the potential for bias but I am running it in multiple forums for different interests to try and cancel out any bias and get a reasonable average. Thank you for voting if you have.

On Sun, 29 Jan 2012 15:57:39 +0000, tommy060289
wrote:

------------------------------------------------------------------------
A poll associated with this post was created, to vote and see the
results, please visit http://www.gardenbanter.co.uk/showth...hreadid=202007
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Question: How much time do you spend in your garden at the weekend

- Weekend (day time) - 0-2 hours
- Weekend (day time) - 2-5 hours
- Weekend (day time) - 5-8 hours
- Weekend (day time) - 8-10 hours
- Weekend (day time) - 10+ hours
- Weekend (evening) - 0-2 hours
- Weekend (evening) - 2-5 hours
- Weekend (evening) - 5-8 hours
- Weekend (evening) - 8-10 hours
- Weekend (evening) - 10+ hours
------------------------------------------------------------------------

They do say weekend in this poll, its because there is two polls
running.

and kay, sorry for any confusion caused - I'm basically after the time
people spend in the garden where they are running a feature like a water
feature or some lighting. The two polls should allow me to see roughly
where people spend the time (daytime vs evening and weekday vs weekend)
and how much time they spend during these times.

I agree with you that the poll has the potential for bias but I am
running it in multiple forums for different interests to try and cancel
out any bias and get a reasonable average. Thank you for voting if you
have.

Tommy

As far as GardenBanter is concerned, as Kay says, it's only a portal
to this newsgroup (delve a bit into GardenBanter and you'll find the
info about this). IME, GardenBanter contributors appear when they want
to ask a question. Members of this group (URG) answer and the
GardenBanter contributor then disappears until they want to ask the
next question. URG members are not generally GardenBanter members and
so cannot vote in any poll, nor will we actually see those polls, only
some representation of them. I'd guess that you'll have very few
responses to your poll, but FWIW:...

I have a pond with a mains powered pump in it which pumps the water
through a filter and all that, and feeds a small waterfall and a
fountain. It works on a timer whether or not I'm in the garden; indeed
whether or not I'm in the house at all. I have a lot of solar powered
lighting in the garden which comes on at dusk whether or not I'm in or
out. If I spend time in the garden whilst the pond pump is working or
the solar lighting is on that's pure co-incidence. Is your survey
looking for times when someone goes into the garden and actively turns
the water feature on? If so, my answer would be "zero".

I also have mains powered lighting but this is only used for "events"
when there's no gardening going on; rather the garden is an extension
of the house and we're entertaining guests outdoors or just enjoying a
glass or two on our own. We couldn't count the time as "per week" or
"per weekend"; it's "when it happens".

To be honest, though, I think you need to rethink your questions.

Cheers, Jake
=======================================
Urgling happily from the dryer end of Swansea Bay where
the four seasons are salt,pepper,mustard and vinegar.

"tommy060289" wrote ..


------------------------------------------------------------------------
A poll associated with this post was created, to vote and see the
results, please visit
http://www.gardenbanter.co.uk/showth...hreadid=202007
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Question: How much time do you spend in your garden at the weekend

- Weekend (day time) - 0-2 hours
- Weekend (day time) - 2-5 hours
- Weekend (day time) - 5-8 hours
- Weekend (day time) - 8-10 hours
- Weekend (day time) - 10+ hours
- Weekend (evening) - 0-2 hours
- Weekend (evening) - 2-5 hours
- Weekend (evening) - 5-8 hours
- Weekend (evening) - 8-10 hours
- Weekend (evening) - 10+ hours
------------------------------------------------------------------------

They do say weekend in this poll, its because there is two polls
running.

and kay, sorry for any confusion caused - I'm basically after the time
people spend in the garden where they are running a feature like a water
feature or some lighting. The two polls should allow me to see roughly
where people spend the time (daytime vs evening and weekday vs weekend)
and how much time they spend during these times.

I agree with you that the poll has the potential for bias but I am
running it in multiple forums for different interests to try and cancel
out any bias and get a reasonable average. Thank you for voting if you
have.


Well Tommy my pond pump runs a biological filter system, it runs 24/7 and
has done for about 30 years. We also have a few solar lights but they only
last a few hours each evening before running out of steam. As for the amount
of time we spend in the garden, it's almost 0 hours although occasionally I
have to do some work for a few hours, evenings is certainly 0 hours as our
garden is too small to sit in with half under water.
--
Regards. Bob Hobden.
Posted to this Newsgroup from the W of London, UK

Bob - thats some interesting data and something I will have to consider when I run a final model.

What kind of pond is it? does it contain fish or does it just act as a 24/7 water pump.

I know in my experience people tend to just run water features when they are likely to be around them but if you have a need to filter the system then obviously you need to run 24/7? What are your reasons for running 24/7?

It's common to run 24/7 to aerate the water - for example to have a little fountain going. Filters are generally run 24/7 - they're run for the pond dwellers' benefit, not the pond owner's; the only alternative might be to run them on a time switch.

It's rather nice to to walk into the garden and have everything running - for example, when we had a stream linking a higher and a lower pond, we kept the pump going 24/7, otherwise the stream would have run dry. And a water feature of that type just lacks the impact if you have to start it up specially.

On the other hand, if you have decided only to run the water features when you are there to enjoy them means that you probably are not going to switch them on while you settle to weed the veg bed.

So asking people how long they spend in the garden and using that as a surrogate for how long they'd use power in the garden isn't really going to work.

"tommy060289" wrote ...

------------------------------------------------------------------------
A poll associated with this post was created, to vote and see the
results, please visit
http://www.gardenbanter.co.uk/showth...hreadid=202007
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Question: How much time do you spend in your garden at the weekend

- Weekend (day time) - 0-2 hours
- Weekend (day time) - 2-5 hours
- Weekend (day time) - 5-8 hours
- Weekend (day time) - 8-10 hours
- Weekend (day time) - 10+ hours
- Weekend (evening) - 0-2 hours
- Weekend (evening) - 2-5 hours
- Weekend (evening) - 5-8 hours
- Weekend (evening) - 8-10 hours
- Weekend (evening) - 10+ hours
------------------------------------------------------------------------

Bob - thats some interesting data and something I will have to consider
when I run a final model.

What kind of pond is it? does it contain fish or does it just act as a
24/7 water pump.

I know in my experience people tend to just run water features when they
are likely to be around them but if you have a need to filter the system
then obviously you need to run 24/7? What are your reasons for running
24/7?


Large fish.
--
Regards. Bob Hobden.
Posted to this Newsgroup from the W of London, UK