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collecting rainwater

  • Thread starter daniello
  • Start date
for those of you who use rainwater to water your CPs, how do you collect it? i just collected a ton of rainwater from the downspout off my roof, but when i posted about it on another forum i was told that it probably wasn't good to use because of stuff leaching out of the shingles. the water was a kind of murky brown. does anyone here use rainwater from the roof? do you filter it or anything before using it? if you collect rainwater some other way, how do you do it?

thanks!
 
I collect it from my roof. And I havnt seen any negative effect on the plants.
 
If you have a greenhouse you can collect it off that roof. But otherwise just put out trays and start collecting!! :)
 
pluto, av, what type of material is your roofing made of?
 
I have used rain water off the roof over 3 years now and have not had any problems.

What I have noticed, if it has not rained for some time, pollen, dust, dirt, etc will collect on the roof. It takes a good rain 15 - 20 minutes to rinse off this junk. I do not collect any water till it is clear.
 
shingles, but I don't collect rainwater.... Where I'm at we aren't even suppose to eat pond fish more then twice a week due to the high mercury levels in the rain (I'm in the heart of coal country, SE Ky.)
 
Its normal terracotta :p And My bucket is always full of leaves, dirt, worms and other strange stuff which sinks to the bottom. But still no ill effects on the plants.
 
That's basically what I have been doing for over a year now. I would understand if the water was ponding on the roof and had opportunity to leach impurities, but a rainstorm normally passes through quickly enough that there aren't issues. It may not be a perfect approach, but it's easy, cheap, and effective, if you live where it rains frequently enough. And my observations are identical to that of elgecko's.
 
  • #10
solar stills are another method that is popular in the less developed parts of the world, they can range in size from tiny to large...

I use to give the boy scout merit badge in energy, part of my requirements was have the scouts build a solar oven, it will amaze ya how well this can work with only the most basic of materials

small demo size
 
  • #11
thanks for the links to rainwater collecting and solar stills, av. those are very helpful.

i hate to ask the same question again, but elgeco/jim, what material is your roofing made of? because i think different roofs can be more/less harmful depending on what they're made of. mine is asphalt shingles, which is why i am more concerned about chemicals leaching. but if you two have asphalt shingles too, and no problems, maybe i will worry less about it.
 
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