[chasp2003]

Can anyone recommend a plant that won't mind being watered by the waste water from my washing machine? Doesn't have to be frost resistant and can be quite large (up to small tree size).

Our house has a septic tank and the water from the washing machine can destroy the balance of bacteria in it, so I want to use it elsewhere if poss.

[noshed]

Most things should be OK I would have thought, unless you use a particularly toxic soap. The soil might get a bit slimy, just keep the surface dug over to make sure it soaks in OK.

[richyrich7]

Think your spot on there Noshed, most plants will stand it, unless you use salt for water softening I'm not sure then.

[Trillium]

Most laundry soaps contain surfectants which do the 'scrubbing' on textiles, so they may not agree with a lot of plants as well as their higher alkalinity which makes soaps bubble and such. Softened water as such doesn't contain salt unless your system has a serious leak; however, the water used to 'rinse' through the salt will be heavily dosed. We pump the latter through a special drain because no plants can handle it.

If anything, you're best to use the greywater out of sinks which handle less soap and of a milder type.

[GreenOwl]

What about using a kinder washing powder or one of those Ecoballs so the water will be kinder on the plants and soil?

There was a thread on ecoballs under Frugal living:
http://www.chat.allotment-garden.org/viewtopic.php?t=23012

[Trillium]

The newer 'green' (ecology friendly) soaps would be okay to use as 'greywater' on the gardens. They won't contain surfectants, TSPs or other harsh cleaners.

[greenqueen]

I've recently 'found' a gadget that syphons bath water outside into a tank or water butt,  I'm going to buy one  

greenqueen

[JulesJ]

The newer 'green' (ecology friendly) soaps would be okay to use as 'greywater' on the gardens. They won't contain surfectants, TSPs or other harsh cleaners.

I've checked my Ecover liquid + powder, and they both contain <5-15% non-ionic surfactants, although they don't specify what those surfactants are. Typically Ecover is marketed as containing plant-based ingredients. They talk about 'critical dilution volume' as in how much water you'd need to neutralise each dose of product, and their Bio products need 5000 times fewer litres of water to neutralise than your bog-standard products.