Rainwater Harvesting

For anyone looking for some info on  rainwater and water harvesting here is a break down of what we got up to at Permaship this April i hope you find it useful


https://sites.google.com/site/permaship1/whats-in-and-around-shipka/permaculture-courses/water-harvesting-permablitz-write-up


If you are in the Balkans this summer please come and see us

All the best

Paul
Permaship Team

https://sites.google.com/site/permaship1/

right now all the rainwater from our area is channeled into a pond that we built on a low spot..but I have thought about putting in some containment vessel to hold some of the rainwater for household use, esp if there was a power outage.

I just finished giving a couple of workshops on this at the Midwest Renewable Energy Fair in Custer, Wisconsin on June 18 & 19. If you would like to see the web page we've devoted to this and the photos of the system we use you can find it here: http://www.GeoPathfinder.com/9566 . We've had more rain than we can store this June, 3 times normal, but a very dry spring. Normally we collect for household use in April but had to wait until mid-May this year.

Bob Dahse.

I can hardly recommend highly enough the books and videos by Brad Lancaster:

http://www.harvestingrainwater.com/

Demand for water is growing in most cities as every urban citizen requires almost double the amount of water that a rural citizen requires. Not long ago, most of our cities were self sufficient in meeting their water needs from the extensive urban water bodies to supply water to citizens. Today these water bodies have completely disappeared. Groundwater is being extracted by the government as well as the private parties. Let me add one more site to the above, visit: rainwaterharvesting.org

Maybe we need to filter our rain water, http://testtherain.com/?p=1123
I've been lurking around for quite awhile. Thought I'd post,
since this is becoming my largest concern.
What few plants I planted  outside this year are dead from something.
A lot of other plants around here are also suffering from about the same symptoms.
I've been searching like crazy since July 12th to find out what this was.
I'm not liking what I'm finding.
Rainwater can be very polluted.
I was going to plant raised beds outside - I've given up.
Now I want to move and put every thing into greenhouses.
I'm in E. Tx. the "sweet" spot for the gulf rains to hang out before they turn and go North East.
I know the ozone is also really bad this year, but I think something is in the rain.
I've got sample cups coming to test my rainwater.
Reports are staring to come in at the site I listed above.
I was hoping for good reports but I know something is wrong.
This rain falls in patches so it doesn't hit everywhere all the time.
I'm afraid that the powers that be will try to hide this for as long as possible , so they can't be blamed.
I've done tons of research on this, I'll try and post more when I'm not so tired.

filter rainwater? why?
oh. maybe you were taliking about cities.
but i say give yer roof a yearly wash and bask in the oxygen and minerals your local rain can supply you.

Maybe designing an addition to your water-collection-system to deal with the contaminants would work in your situation - For example, running the water into a pond with filtering plants, aerate the water, use ultraviolet lighting to kill microbes, etc.  depending on the contaminants you have to deal with. 

I hope your tests come back with only good news, but if they don't hang in there, there is much that can be done to deal with contaminants.