Garden Bores in Perth: Suitability, Licensing and Running Costs

Domestic garden bores are common across Perth, and for a good reason: much of the metropolitan area sits over a shallow watertable that is reachable with a modest bore and a modest pump.

But "much of" is not "all of", and the rules around bores are widely misunderstood. Here is what actually applies.

Need a hand rather than a how-to? Call us on (08) 6263 4644 — repairs are booked, not quoted, and most faults are fixed in the same visit.

Does your block suit a bore?

Groundwater access across greater Perth falls into roughly three bands. Of the suburbs we cover:

• 260 suburbs sit over reliably accessible groundwater. Garden bores are common and generally a sound investment.
• 69 suburbs are variable. Access depends on your exact spot, sometimes street by street. Worth assessing rather than assuming.
• 38 suburbs have limited access. Bores are uncommon and usually not the right answer.

Depth to water, yield and water quality all vary locally. Iron content is the usual complication — high-iron bore water stains paving, limestone and rendered walls, and it is a chemistry problem to design around rather than a reason not to proceed.

Every suburb page on this site states which band that suburb falls into. Find yours via service areas.

When you need a licence — and when you do not

This is the part that gets misreported most often, so plainly:

Most domestic garden bores in the Perth metropolitan area do not need a licence.

You do need one if any of the following apply:

• You are irrigating 2,000 m² (0.2 hectares) or more of lawn and garden — it's the area you water that counts, not the size of the block
• The water is used commercially — produce growing, industrial or mining use
• You are drawing from a deeper confined aquifer such as the Leederville or Yarragadee, rather than the shallow superficial watertable

The 2,000 m² threshold is the one that catches people. It is a live question on a large outer-metro or semi-rural block and irrelevant on a standard suburban lot.

Licensing sits with the Department of Water and Environmental Regulation, not with your local council and not with Water Corporation. Your council isn't entirely uninvolved though — bore pump noise is enforced by local government under the Environmental Protection (Noise) Regulations 1997, which matters if the pump runs before 9am.

There is no state driller's licence for an exempt garden bore — the WA Government recommends using an accredited driller, and the construction standard is applied through licence conditions that an exempt bore doesn't carry. It is strongly worth doing anyway; it just isn't a legal requirement the way it's often described.

Bore water is still on the roster

The single most common misconception we hear on site: that a bore means you can water whenever you like.

It has not meant that since the 2022 roster change. Garden bores are rostered in their own right:

• Two days a week, aligned to the scheme-water roster
• Once a day, either before 9am or after 6pm
• Restriction period runs 1 September to 31 May
• The winter sprinkler switch-off from 1 June to 31 August applies to bores as well as scheme water. It bans reticulation — a handheld hose or watering can stays legal all winter

There is a $100 on-the-spot fine for watering between 9am and 6pm, during the switch-off, or outside your rostered days. The maximum on prosecution is $500.

So a bore does not buy you more watering. It buys you cheaper watering.

What a bore actually saves

Bore water is not metered, so the running cost is the electricity to pump it rather than the volume you use. On a decent-sized garden that is a real saving, and it compounds over years.

What it does not do is fix a system that waters unevenly. A bore feeding poorly matched nozzles wastes free water instead of paid water, and produces the same dry patches. The efficiency work is worth doing either way — see Perth soil types and how to water them.

Be realistic about the whole cost too. A bore is drilling, a pump, a controller and the electrical work, plus ongoing maintenance. Pumps do not last forever, and iron-affected bores need periodic attention.

What goes wrong with bores

The failures we attend most often, in rough order:

1. Pressure or flow dropping off — usually a worn impeller, a partly blocked intake or a falling watertable late in a dry summer.
2. Pump not starting — control gear, capacitor or the pressure switch far more often than the pump itself.
3. Iron fouling — staining on paving and walls, and gradual restriction inside the system.
4. Air in the line — a bore drawing air from a dropping watertable will cavitate and damage the pump if it keeps running.

We install, service and repair bores, bore pumps and bore-fed reticulation, as well as mains systems. Our bore pump troubleshooting guide covers the checks worth doing yourself before booking.

Bore or a better system?

If groundwater access on your block is poor or the numbers do not stack up, the alternative is not a compromise. A properly zoned scheme-water system with matched nozzles and a modern controller uses markedly less water than an old system, and the saving arrives without drilling anything.

That is a genuine comparison we will make on site rather than a sales position — sometimes the bore is right, sometimes it is not.

Sources: licensing thresholds and aquifer rules from the Department of Water and Environmental Regulation; bore roster, times, restriction period and penalties from garden bore water restrictions. Verified 28 July 2026 — rules change, so confirm before acting.