And just like that, the barrels and tubs of rainwater, which I had strategically used up over the past few weeks, are back on their way to be full again. We got a big fat rain in the early hours this morning, after getting some yesterday and a bit the night before.
According to my weather app, we got 1.45 inches of cloud-juice in the past six hours, and 1.9 inches in the past 24 hours.
Here’s a post I made yesterday on my DEEP GREEN Facebook page, with a video:
(video duration 2 min 46 sec)
Rainwater catching setups range from very sophisticated, with connections and sensors and all sorts of things; to stacked containers with hoses and spigots; to the simplest which is just lining up containers under your roof line.
My setup is somewhere in between; among other things I actually invested in used barrels and a set of (new) tubs. I live in a 1000 square-foot house with three of us living here, but I needed for my system to be able to be managed by myself alone because the other two household members have their own fulltime occupations.
The water is used mainly for supplemental irrigation during the dry season, and for cooling off during the hot season. And, in all seasons, for washing (clothes, and body).
I periodically do strategic releases of the water for evaporative cooling, and or management of high stormwater volumes.
Note, I do this by hand, but a person with the skills and inclination and financial means could have a system of hoses and sensors and things.
I will say, there are advantages to doing tasks like hauling water. It can be fairly beneficial to a middle-aged body, as long as one doesn’t try to do too much too fast, and it saves money that I used to spend on the gym in my younger vainer days.
And, I often joke that as I get old-old, one day I will have instant Brady Bunch grandkids, great-grandkids, Zombie Apocalypse lifestyle apprentices, or whatever, and they will be out here helping with the water and we will all be having fun splashing each other. <laugh icon>
Additional recommended resources:
•Brad Landcaster YouTube channel, “Planting the Rain to Grow Abundance” (TED Talk; about 16 minutes) and all of his other videos also.
•My friend/permaculture colleague Chris Searles BioIntegrity YouTube channel, check out his videos about making it rain in Texas through strategic watering of large oak trees & other deciduous trees.
You can check out the video here, on my deep green Facebook page.
#water #rain #stormwater #mitigatingdroughtfloodextremes #microclimate