A Better Way to Harvest Rainwater

It is NO longer a crime in CO to have/use a rain barrel. The image shows the barrel overflowing. NOT good - use an appropriate sized overflow and safely redirect that water away from the foundation of your home! A great place for rain barrel kits and parts is: http://www.aquabarrel.com/index.php , http://www.aquabarrel.com/product_rain_barrel_plastic_parts.php

I love the idea of catching rain water for the garden/yard what have you. However, in Colorado and other upstream western states, it is illegal to catch and store the water that lands on your property. This water actually belongs to the guys downstream (California, Kansas ...)

You can find linking kits for 55 gallon barrels and lots of other rain barrel related stuff at Aquabarrel. They have all the parts you need to link barrels in series - When I needed extra help with sourcing parts for my rain barrel they were very helpful - ask for Barry - he's great at figuring out what you need to make your rain barrel system work...Aquabarrel comes up prety high in Google too so they must be pretty good at what they do

My website describes (incl. pictures) how to build a rain barrel, and hook them up in series. You can also read top expert's opinions about rooftop collected water safety and use our harvesting rainfall calculator. All at:

http://home.comcast.net/~leavesdance/rainbarrels/construction.html

Think of the SOIL as part of your storage system, HeirloomCountry. So if you get a light rain of only 1/8 inch, this system would put maybe twice that amount onto your garden beds. If you have had lots of rain and the soil is soaked, then you might want to divert rainwater away from the garden, temporarily. But otherwise, every time it rains your garden will get extra water from the roof runoff--it can be "stored" in the subsoil until the plants need it.

Speaking of roof runoff, I have not seen any research to indicate that there are chemicals in runoff from asphalt shingles that would be toxic to plants. I would not advise drinking such water, but I would think it would be OK for irrigation purposes.

Wait a minute though, I just finished reading this whole article, only to find out that I would then have the perfect set-up to water my garden- IN THE RAIN? (If it's raining, why do I need to WATER it?) I still have NOT increased the holding capcity of my barrel, only my ability to water with the still same amount that I had before. Now if an articles idea were to show one how to set up a multi-barrel containment system, say with an incorpoarted float valve on each, so that as one barrel "filled up" in the line, the water from the roof would then flow into the next barrel and so on down the line. Because yes, a 55 gallong barrel won't hold more than 55 gallons, no matter how many spigots or hoses you attach to it!

A word of caution! Many chemicals may be in the runoff water if you have an asphalt shingle roof. I like the idea of using rain runoff but not a good idea for the garden if there is a lot of chemicals leaching from the roof into the water. My roof is one of those that does leach chemicals. Very obviouse by the burning of tender plants along the drip edge of my roof. I hope to someday replace it with a metal roof but for now it will have to stay. I am currently trying to think of a way to direct the water to a small retention pond for collection and cleaning by aquatic vegetation.

Great idea. Some cities north of the border already are sponsoring residents with rain barrel and set up kits. Though they ahve a dry year, they are concern about water shortage. Over here in California, we have droughts for years, warning of water shortage and possible rationing, but nothing was done by government agencies, city government, county non state. This is indeed very sad. Why wait until the last minute and rush out to get barrels to store water.

We have been looking for rain barrels, but they were very expansive, not to spead of the shipping charges. Local hardware store in the San Francisco/San Jose Bay area did not carry any of these rain harvester/rain barrel in their inventory. It will be nice if someone can point to some good sources for good quality and very affordable rain harvest products.