My rain barrel system for the HEBs aEBS

My Honey Doer is a great guy but around our house I am the Handy girl. Like Karen everything outside is mine except the mowing. If a shovel or a hoe had a TV remote he might, [just might,] hit a lick. I married him cause he was a cute little airforce guy. I have a son to help out with the lifting. I don't mind doing the stuff outside cause it all my baby. I guess I'm a bit of a control freak out there.

Most the guys I know don't get as excited about gardening as I do, they tell me, just pluck it in a pot and let it go. LOL That's hard for me to do, we know this right? LOL
joy

HILLARYT,
If that stand for your barrel looked funny, they go ahead! You can laugh at it and your health improves by laughing!! LOL! A good option is to build a small platform out of stone and cement to suit the width of the barrel and that can be close to your house. That could look neat enough for you and prevent you from laughing at it!! Also, you can plan for your other future barrels you want to add. There will be space. You need not keep the barrels adjacent to the walls only. You can keep them away from the house wall in any convenient place. Choose such a place if you have - I'm sure you will have. You can simply divert the downspout where you keep the barrels. It is easy. If it overhangs your way, you can add an iron pillar [or even a garden arch -- I see from your picture that you CAN do it!] to support the leading pipe and you can grow some climber on this pillar!! You can make so many things. Do not let a single water of rain go waste. Gutter is the wrong option. Allow it to go, instead, into the open ground and let the earth absorb the extra water. For that you can make a pit and divert it there.

Hope that helps... to laugh more at these funny ideas??

If you only knew the craziness I invented on a regular basis, you would know the nonstop laugher I have. Happiness is a surpless in our garden! Many of the local birds think I'm a lost hyena.

I'm actually thinking about buying barrel racks that allow the barrels to stack sideways 3 high and putting the spigot on the bottom or top of the barrel. Then one would drain down to the next and on and on. Then the pond pump could help it get to my plants. That would look cool and I would have 177 gallons of capacity in 4 or 6 places where the downspouts come down = 700+ gallons.

You see, I live in wine country over populated with wine snobs (I'm one of them) and many of my clients come over to the house for wine on the patio. It has to look slick because I need clients to fund my garden :-).

How about a sump pump in first barrel ,,This could pump water to the other barrels.Allowing you to put the group of storage barrels just about anywhere.I think!!!!

Tubby

Karen they call that..."Its my way or the highway" LOL

Had supervisor a friend his favorite saying was "call grayhound your gone"

Fortunately DW & I work well together..MOSTLY..LOL

Tubbytee: Your idea about the sump pump is perfect! I did the same thing with a pond pump when I first got started but it involved little ole me out there in the rain and I had better things to do.

Listen up Hillary! With a sump pump in the first barrel attached to the sump hose, [inch and a half, I think,] buried under ground to where ever you wanted the next barrels you'd be home free. You could disguise the barrels easily enuff, and put them close to where you needed them. You'd be the queen of the rain kingdom, girl. You'd have to set the sump to start running when the barrel was full or half full or elsr just let it run whenever. Automatic. Cheap. Effective. Let's hear it for Tubbytee.

Dinu,
Your ideas are wonderful as I well know. By the way, could you sneak a photo in here to show the folks where you work? {Be prepared to be amazed people!]

Karen, I am pretty sure we have a common distant relative. Tee hee

Hey Joy, I know you must get enough water in Fla to never feel the need to save it but who knows? That huge drought last year emptied the reservoirs in many southern areas.

We get horrible droughts here to August sometimes til late September. BUT we do get sporadic rain, usually hard brief rain that runs off this hard baked clay and right out to the street and the city gutters. Happily for me, it also runs off the roof into my system.


This message was edited Feb 27, 2009 9:28 AM

Hillaryt,
I am looking again at the photo of your yard. That is a beautiful barrel that even a "wine snob" should be impressed with, even envious of. A few more like that placed where you wanted them could only enhance your area. {Make the snobs want to go home and do the same.] giggles

Hillaryt, [LOL you will regret posting on this thread I think,] Use whatever new [and beautiful] barrels as places to put large flower containers with trailing flowers that enhance the barrel, put a small table top on one of them, [might take some finageling,] and draw 2 bar chairs up to it. Lots of stuff you can do to make your barrels the envy and the tutor of other water starved folks.

This message was edited Feb 27, 2009 9:53 AM

One final thought Hillary...[maybe.] If you employ sump system Tubby mentioned and the drip system for each of your barrels and have them whereYOU want them you won't need to put them on a stand. the water will go where YOU want, when YOU want. Nuff of me, I say.

Devota the 11/2" discharge can be reduced down to 3/4"..Remember the pipe thread on pump & reducer will not fit garden hose thread..No problem they make an adapter fitting..Pipe thread on one end & garden hose thread on the other..Available at any hardware or wall-mart ect...

The threads look close to the same..Until you see them on the adapter Then its easy to see the diff..

The sump pump as a float for automatic turn on/off..I should say they make pumps without automatic on/off...I think they are cheaper..Which is fine if you are home when it rains.Just plug it in & run back in house soaked,,LOL

I have to have one in old basement (ground water).I'm on my 4th pump in 16 years.This one is life time warranty.
From Menards. if It quits they said just bring it back & they will replace it....Last spring it was only off approx. 1 minute between cycles .A lot of on/off & alot of elec...Geeeeerr

I like the sump pump idea! I could actually run the line under the pathway to the other side of the archway. I have drip line hooked up for that whole side, but I could easily support several of my raised beds over there. That would be cool.

I have part of my yard dismantled right now to accomodate some work we're doing on the house, but as soon as I get my barrels I'll post more pictures of my set up.

Thanks for the ideas! :-)

I'm sure you don't need to told BUT..You can hide the barrels with privacy fence covered with vines .
Grape vines no doubt LOL

Now, if I could figger out how to get one of those things so I could have water pouring into it and Bob's fertilizer sitting in another one and then just the right amount of Bob's fertilzer and just the right amount if water going to a automatic watering system, I'd have it made in the shade.
joy

I definately have grape vines growing in the yard. You can see the stakes (near the blue chair). They're just starting to push this weeks so I should have a great crop this year. We had a heat wave in January and I was so afraid they would push early and then we'd get a frost and kill the buds. Fortunately they didn't push early and we DID have a frost just last week. Now I'm on frost alert.

I do like my barrels sitting about the yard. Everywhere you go in this county there are wine barrels used as decoration. Mine is just functional :-) Don't want to hide a $1,000 french oak barrel!

Here is what I have done. I took this picture when it was raining. The water is collected in a sump. A pump will take it to the overhead tank for all the house needs. The sump also is connected with direct water supply, which is our main source. In the rainy season, I'll turn off the tap for direct water so that there will be enough space for rain to fill it up. So in my case, it is a mix.