Toulle - a turn of the worm?

[Toulle]

 

[Marianne]

I now have access to some of those 275 gallon things with the metal cages. I'm interested in what your plans are for these things. Where I want to put them to harvest rainwater is quite a ways from the garden. Pretty flat, so gravity isn't going to help much and I'd rather not have to use electricity to power a pump. What ideas have you come up with?

 

[Toulle]

 

[Marianne]

Ahaa, of course, up on a stand! The thing will have 2200 pounds of water in it when full. That's a lot of weight.

I think I have an understanding of your design. I was surprised that you're using the spigot as the 'in' line, too. But I like how everything is underground.

The containers I have access to have a 6" (?) opening with a screw type lid on the top and the spigot at the bottom. I have the perfect location for one, right the corner of my garden. Problem is the water would be harvested from the roof of a big, tall (really tall) hay shed right next to the garden. Getting guttering up on that just isn't going to happen. Even if we did do that, we couldn't keep the guttering on for more than maybe three years. The high winds out here tear guttering off those metal roofs in short order. We have some scrap guttering that was given to us, so I'll have to get out there and see if there's some way that we could attach it to the posts instead. Got a plan cookin' here....some scrap lumber, guttering placed just above the container, much lower and easier to work with.

I purposely created the garden next to that shed so rain water would fall directly into the garden. The grade of the garden is slightly angled, so I hoped that the water would drain towards the opposite side. Of course, the entire garden is getting wet enough from the rain anyway, so that's just adding more. Flooding hasn't been a problem, luckily, even with heavy rains. But it'd be nice to save the rain water for use later.

What about controlling algae in the tank? I see the plastic chicken waterer getting gunked up pretty fast, even when it's in the shade. I can easily shade the container, but I'm afraid that halfway through the season there will be enough goop in it to clog the hose. (I'd have to shade mine or it'd be like a solar water heater.)

 

[Toulle]

 

[JRmom]

Just learned this trick.... if you add a couple of tablespoons of veggie oil (which will sit on the top of the water), it deters mosquitoes.

 

[Toulle]

 

[JRmom]

You remind me of my brother! He works for UF/IFAS and is a mosquito expert. He was even on Good Morning America a few years ago...talking about mosquitoes! What a geek! In a good way of course!

 

[Toulle]

 

[AnnaRaven]

Just learned this trick.... if you add a couple of tablespoons of veggie oil (which will sit on the top of the water), it deters mosquitoes.

Oh yes, that does work. It can also suffocate larvae that are already in there sometimes. I don't think it lasts that long is the only problem. Mono-molecular films are a popular treatment that govt agencies (like I used to work for) use to do in larvae in large areas. It spreads on the surface and suffocates them.


WARNING: GEEK SCIENCE CONTENT AHEAD

These methods don't work so well with some mosquis of the geni Aedes or Culiseta, for different reasons. Most mosqui moms lay their eggs as rafts, floating on the surface of the water. As you can guess, she doesn't care to do this on a sheen of oil. However, many of the genus Aedes such as gold saltmarsh (a really nasty and aggressive little b***h common here) lay their eggs at the edge of the water.
Culiseta, at least C melanura, larvae don't need to surface to breath. They actually attach to cattails and get their oxygen that way!
This is the mosqui that carries such gifts as West Nile Virus and Eastern Equine Encephalitis in our area.

I use a mosquito float to avoid larvae growing in mine. We have WNV here and Equine Encephalitis in our area too. So mosquitos are a bad thing.