In the comment section of my recent video on harvesting rainwater, Ian Burke writes:

“Mine was relatively cheap 700$ in total and it stores 2475 gallons at a time, I did the math out and with city water costs roughly $8.23/1000 gal (sewer&water). In this past year my usage was 57,000 gallons(roughly) which saves me $444 a year…. so even if it costs a little more its worth every penny and will pay for itself if you have city water.”

He then linked to this video he just posted:

This is quite well thought-out and makes financial sense. I’m just a piker compared to this guy. I like that he did the math, figured out the plumbing and built the system – and that he has it set up to irrigate his garden beds. Plants prefer rainwater to chlorinated city water.

Good work, Ian. My hat is off.

Also, I got another comment on good book resources related to rainwater harvesting.

youngonce writes:

“Brad Lancaster is a very good source of information for water harvesting. He has two books on this very important topic.”

His name was familiar to me but I didn’t know him off the top of my head so I looked him up. The guy is impressive.

Brad Lancaster wrote this book:

And this follow up:

I really like the idea of swales and earthworks though I did little along those lines in flat, flat Florida. When I buy a piece of land here I will put them to good use as almost every piece I see has a slope to it.

It’s fitting that as I type this evening there is a crashing downpour of tropical rain outside my window…

Always something new to learn.

If you’re currently thinking about gathering rain water, why not start your plans this winter?