This week there was a lot of rain at our house. There was also a lot of fist-shaking and banging. This is because I was installing our rain barrel.
The rain barrel itself was easy to install. It is simply a half barrel that is designed to fit against a wall. Since we have a townhouse and therefore have very little space in our yard, the barrel needs to lie flat and do its bit to save space, just like everything else in our yard.
However, along with your rain barrel it is also eminently sensible to get a downspout diverter, and for some reason our barrel didn’t come with one. Tip one: get a rain barrel with a diverter. In months of rain, the barrel with the slightly open top filled up a few times. In half an hour of rain, the barrel with the diverter filled up to the brim. Rain barrels with a lid are also safer, since there is no chance that a small child will fall in. They are also better at repelling mosquitoes, since no open water means no mosquito larvae in the water.
What is a downspout diverter and how does it work? Generally, a downspout diverter attaches to an existing spout or to your eaves. It funnels rainwater off of your roof into the waiting rain barrel. When the barrel gets too full, the diverter defaults back to moving water into the ground again.
We live in a rainforest, so why are we using a rain barrel? Well, I like watering my garden with rain water instead of water that has to be cleaned and comes out of a tap. It just makes sense to collect the stuff that would naturally fall on our garden and use it to water the garden. Also, even in a rainforest there are times of drought. It rains infrequently here in the summer time, and if I can collect rain water and use it on my garden during droughts, I will save the tremendous amount of water that people use on their gardens in the summer months.
Do you use a rain barrel?