Does anyone use a rain barrel?

[ncgnance]

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Kudos!!! You just saved me/us all a lot of legwork. YOU 'DA MAN/WOMAN!!!!LOL

 

[jmk3482]

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Kudos!!! You just saved me/us all a lot of legwork. YOU 'DA MAN/WOMAN!!!!LOL

Thanks!! Half my life is lived on the internet! If I have a question, the internet is the FIRST place I go!!

Edited to mention I'm a girl,

 

[TheMartianChick]

I searched for rain barrels awhile back because I plan to utilize sustainable techniques for our semi-retirement business.

I found information about the Pepsi-Cola Company in Baltimore selling food grade barrels very cheaply. This would enable a person to make their own water barrel inexpensively.

http://www.fallschurchenvironment.org/usingrainbarrels.html

I also found that there are companies that sell water storage tanks for agriculture and other businesses. They come in a variety of sizes and are constructed of heavy-duty plastic of some sort. These companies also sell tubing and spigots that can be mounted at the bottom of a barrel if you make an appropriately sized hole.

As a kid, we always used 5 gallon buckets to catch the water that ran off of the roof. Our house had a well and though we never ran out of water, plenty of the neighbors did. We always watered our ducks and chickens with the water that we captured from the roof.

 

[jmk3482]

I'm thinking I like this idea, now where to find a plastic barrel?

 

[flakey chick]

I use one or two heavy plastic tote boxes. I don't worry about mosquitos as I always make sure to use the water up within a week. It gets the squiglers, but they don't have the time to become adults.

I started using the rain water when I got into hydroponics. It is much more pure than our well water. I even had the instruments to measure it. Hydroponic plants are more sensitive to concentrations of elements than chickens.

When I was a kid all our water was cistern water collected from the roof.

 

[nightshade]

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Check to see if you have a pepis bottling cop. near you. Normally they will sell you used food grade barrels for under $10 (which someone already mentioned

) You also want to watch your local freecycle and craigslist. I find barrels on there atleast twice a year in our area for free or less then $10.

I have four.. wait no five rain barrels currently for my garden and flowerbeds hooked to soaker hoses. I am setting up a gutter off my hen house to help fill the duck pond (an old clawfoot tub) as soon as I get the addition on the coop. And I am hooking a smaller rainbarrel up to an auto water for my rabbits.

I built all of mine and have less then $20 in each. Probably less the $10 in most of them. I am also looking into building an above ground cetrine to collect rain water from my barn for my larger animals in. These require elaborite filtration systems and roof flush systems that discard the first water collected from each storm. This keeps things like bird poo from getting into a couple 100 gal tank. But they can be very exspenive to buy so it is still in the "thinking of it" stages. But I am looking for cheap filter system like you would use on your hosehold sink for a rainbarrel, have not had much luck yet mostly because of the connection to a boiler drain/ hose bib.

You just want to be careful that you don't let the water in them long enough to get mosquitoes in. In My garden barrels I use mosquitoes dunks. They work really well but you can not use them in water for animals. All of mine came without lids so I use a peice of window screening over the top to keep out the debris brought with the gutter water or the wind. For watering animals your best bet is to use one with a lid and cut a hole to snuggly fit your gutter spout in. Make sure you have an overflow drain near the top as well. You can hook them to additional barrels or just drain them out of the way.

Hope this helps

If you have any questions on how build one or make them work well in your garden feel free to ask.

 

[Scrambled Egg]

I've had one for about two years, a compost tumbler and a worm bin too. The rain barrel is at the corner of my house to catch the run off from the roof. It's a 50 gallon barrel and is generally full after a good rain. I use it all summer to water my plants with...collects too much pollen, even with a top covered with wire and pebbles. so I can't use the water in my pond or for my critters. Very handy. I take it apart and clean it with bleach water about every 6 months but it never smells or stagnates. The composter is the same size on a rotating frame and I use that in my garden when it is broken down well. No worms at the moment but had several thousand last year and fed them out to my chickens before they could multiply...will restart them in the next few weeks. Sooooo, yes, a rain barrel is a definate plus, love mine.

 

[Southern28Chick]

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Worm bin? I've never heard of one. How does that work? It sounds cool.

You know I'm an all natural chick, have you tried cleaning your rain barrel with borax (a natural mineral used for cleaning)? It's all natural and better for the environment than bleach.

Where did you get your rain barrel? I need about 3...or more.

 

[ams3651]

Ive been wanting one for a while, this is what I found about making one and my county extension office has a class twice a year with a free barrell but I miss it every time.

http://www.montgomeryconservation.org/barrel_program.htm

Many restaurants get oil, etc in large plastic barrels and give them away for the asking.
if you attach window screening to the top it will keep out leaves and mosquitos and put it up on some blocks to help gravity do its thing.

 

[TheMartianChick]

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We started thinking about doing this with real rain barrels (not buckets) after our vacation a few years ago in Bermuda. Bermuda has no bodies of freshwater. All of the houses have limed roofs to allow the water to be collected and stored beneath the structure. For places that need a lot of water (like a resort), they get water delivered in tankers. Our resort ran out of water on our last evening. It took several hours until they got a delivery.