Slight Rain Barrel Detour...

Before I delve into what I expect will be a lengthy post recapping this weekend's interior trim and door frame project... a quick post about some rain barrel progress...

I reached a stand-still this weekend on the inside project, and in my endeavor to keep moving I decided to pour the second (of three) rain barrel pads.  This one is on the front of my carport. 

A wee bit precarious

It was a little trickier to frame and level the form due to obstacles; there was some old concrete from when they poured my carport that I guess had oozed out between the form planks.  There was a tree root which interfered with leveling... and there was a fence corner where my fence juts out to allow space for a neighbor's tree.  The good news is, I was still able to use the form from the first pad that I poured.  I had to notch out for the tree root, and it took a lot more work to get it level than the first one.

After I got it framed and stabilized, I placed the criss-cross of rebar in the middle, and went to Home Depot and bought 3 - 60 pound bags of concrete.  Three bags is what the last form took; in fact I had extra -- but as it turns out, I should have bought 4 for this form.  Alas. 

I mixed it up in my favorite tangerine orange wheel barrow and heaved it into the form, smoothed it out, and confirmed I was all still level -- the form and the resulting concrete, since it fell below the form frame.

Then I got ambitious and decided to paint this barrel and the one on the back corner of my carport (both are bright blue recycled food containers).  First I removed all the adhesive labels -- which pulled off dreamily easily -- have you ever bought a clay pot where the price tag was on the top lip and it shreds when you try to remove?  Hello?  Why don't they put those on the bottom?  Ugh! 

Then I scrubbed down both barrels with a 1:1 mixture of vinegar and water to remove the dirt.  I had some primer (Kilz 1-2-3 Professional) left over from my culvert planters* so I put a coat of that on both barrels and while that dried I headed to Home Depot for some terra cotta colored spray paint.  Which they did not have.  They had something called "cinnamon" but it wasn't quite right.  I ended up with sort of a khaki color -- it's fine.  It may even be better...

I figure I can always paint over it if I change my mind.  It is recommended that I apply 2 coats of polyurathane over the final color.  I haven't done that yet.  But may I just say -- yowser! what a shockingly huge improvement over that blinding blue!

At some point maybe I'll get crazy and do a colorful design.  Here are a couple photos of some barrels I found online...

Photo courtesy of Cobb County Watershed Stewardship Program, Cobb County, Georgia

But as I've learned -- first with the culvert project and now with these -- it's a lot more surface area than you think it is when you begin painting!  Ha ha  So... maybe not.

At any rate, I'll look forward to the pad setting up and getting the newly painted barrel back in place.  It will sure look better looking down my driveway from the street too!  I have one left to do -- the one on the front corner of my house.  That barrel just emptied yesterday.  (That leaves me just two partial barrels of water left.  C'mon, rain!)

*The last of which you can see in the background of the photo above -- I can't decide where to put it, and until I decide where to put it I can't determine final paint color...so there it waits, primed... 

Rain Barrel Details...

As my rain barrels empty I am trying to take advantage of the ability to move them (Fact:  50 gallons of water weighs approximately 417 pounds.  Lesson?  Put your barrels where you want them!) and get the proper footings under them.

I have custom steel tables under two of my barrels, courtesy of the steel company who built my back steps.   Oh how I wish I had asked for more!  (Those little yellow Blackfoot Daisies at the base?  They are 4 feet tall now!)

My other 3 barrels I have up on concrete blocks, and the blocks are just sitting on the ground; i.e. they aren't exactly level.  So, on my list of things to do is to pour a concrete pad for each of them to get them to sit level (and look better.) 

For the one that is on blocks that faces my neighbors' driveway, I'd also plan to build a wooden box (beadboard?) to hide the concrete blocks which are nothing pretty to look at, regardless of shrubs to hide them... but that's another day.

Looks precarious, doesn't it?  Considering the weight...

Yesterday I got one pad poured:

This is for the barrel that is on my garage, back by the alley.  I framed in a 24" x 24" square, leveled it, place 2 sticks of rebar in it, and poured concrete over the whole thing.  The leveling took me the longest... and then it took 3 - 60 pound bags of concrete!   That surprised me -- I was sure that I had done the math wrong on how much I would need, but indeed -- 3 bags.  Just the mixing of it made me glad that I had mentally committed to only doing one pad per day -- uff da.

I was going to stamp in the year like I did on the footings for my steps --

or some other funky design, but in the end I didn't.  Frankly it was really hot out and I got lazy.  And, only the little corners will show anyway -- the pad will mostly be covered up by the concrete blocks.  (Queen of Rationalization still reigns.)

I figure I'll let it set up for a few days and then I'll put it all back and snap another photo for your viewing pleasure.

I also plan to paint the barrels.  They are old food storage barrels, and being plastic I was told there is a special type of paint that they will take.  Of course the name escapes me... but I still have my paperwork from the rain barrel workshop so I'll look it up.  Bright blue isn't exactly in my backyard color wheel.  I mean, it could be... my gazing ball is that color, but ... it's a lot of bright blue.

On a totally unrelated note -- I was hand watering out front this morning, and eye-spied a fat and happy caterpillar on my 5 foot parsley plant.  Surprised I looked closer... and found another one.  And, another one.  And... yes another one!  Four.  Fat.  Happy.  Clearly I haven't been paying attention because they have to have been there for days.

Ahhh -- so nice!

We had an intense round of  thunderstorms overnight!  The thunder woke me up around 3, and I mostly tossed and turned after that, listening to the blissful sounds of rain.  I nearly got up to go sit on my porch, but ultimately was too lazy -- snuggled down in the bed.  Doggy never even lifted her head -- she is unphased by storms.

My rain barrels are replenished -- well, except for the one on my back steps that I have out of place while in the process of applying wood preservative.  It almost killed me to not let that one fill up... but considering it weighs over 400 pounds full, I made myself leave it alone.  I noted this morning that where I have already applied preservative the water beaded up on the wood.  Sweet.

My tomatoes were tipped over from the winds, but don't appear to have sustained any real damage.  I uprighted them and they seem fine.  I did, however, notice that another tomato has been munched on by something -- and this time a green one!  I think I'm going to put the bird netting over them that I bought for my raspberries (and put on, then removed, because I hadn't given it a proper structure.)  And I also have a gizmo that you hook up to the hose and it's motion sensitive -- when it senses motion it sprays water!  I'd been needing a good reason to take it out of the box -- and this is it.  It's been suggested to me that it isn't squirrels eating them... and frankly I'm not sure I want to know what else it might be...

I am so pleased with the good soaking all my plants got -- the morning seemed all fresh and new.  We had such a pleasant dog walk this morning -- and everyone I passed was in almost a holiday mood with the change in weather.  I'll enjoy it while I can.

And a shout-out to my parents, who celebrated their 63rd wedding anniversary on Sunday, and to my sister in Minnesota, who just had her birthday -- I promise, my gift should have arrived by now!! 

The Beginning...

Here's a happy patch of Sweet Lavender, in the corner between two of the yoga platforms.  It should grow to be about 2 feet tall with fragrant blossoms.

Here is some purple Phlox that I planted tucked under a broken pot.  There is another one using the other half of the pot in another part of the yard.  It will grow into mounds, looking like it spilled out of the pot.

This morning I put in seeds in front of the two front yoga platforms.  On the left I put in a butterfly mix of seeds, and on the right I did a huge spread of orange California Poppy seeds.  I threw a light layer of mulch over it to help me remember where I have planted, and to help retain some moisture.  (I could take a photo for you, but it would be pretty boring:  "Here is the left patch of dirt, and here is the right patch of dirt!  Isn't it exciting?!"  The sad part of that is, I really do think it's exciting... LOL)

I also planted seeds on the back side of my raised garden beds:  a mix of butterfly attracting plants, (Compass Plant, Gaura, Fleabane) and then an entire packet of Mammoth Sunflower seeds.  It's fun to have space to sow entire packets of seeds and hope for huge patches of color.  It's also free fun, as they are all seeds that I had saved from last year.  Bonus.

We had quite storm on Monday night -- the day after all the backyard work was done -- and I was worried about how it would all hold up in its temporary state.  It was mostly fine -- a little mud slid over one of the pieces of flagstone, but I knew that was an area that would need more help.  I couldn't do it yet because I still have one more day of work coming on my wooden steps.  That's happening either Thursday or Friday.

The good news is, my rain barrels were replenished.  Once again they are all too heavy to rock on their stands -- yay!  In particular the one by my raspberries was getting low, so I am grateful for a free refill.  Even the smaller barrel on my porch that only collects via the rain chain from my porch roof has a fair amount of water in it.  What is really strange, however, is that the barrel that was relocated to my sideyard, and got the new downspout?  Totally empty.  I haven't had a chance to investigate that yet, but I need to.  So mysterious... 

So in the coming weeks I'll be choosing plants and shrubs and tucking them in here and there.  I went to buy some last night, but somehow I didn't see anything that I just had to have, and came home empty.  I secretly didn't really want to be out planting last night anyway -- it was SO windy!  I stayed in and did laundry instead.  I know -- I am a wild child.

I have several caterpillars on my fennel out front -- I'm actually worried that there isn't going to be enough fennel to feed them since the plants are not very mature yet... Not sure what I can do about that -- nothing I guess.  I have other fennel plants, guess I will just hope that they find them.

Rain Barrels: What I've Learned

High on my wish list when I bought my house was getting rain barrels in place to save rain water for my garden.  Thanks to Red, I actually had one rain barrel before I even moved in!  My house didn't have gutters so I added those, and I was in business.

 

Rain barrels seemed fairly straightforward to me.  Initially I was most concerned about appearance.   But as is so often the case, nothing beats practical knowledge gained from experience!  This past week I ordered and received my 6th rain barrel, which is my 3rd design; two barrels I bought from Sam's Club.  Two barrels Red and I built at the TAMU Urban Solutions Earth Day rain barrel workshop.  You can see photos of both types here:   http://my1929tudor.blogspot.com/2010/06/giddy.html  Both designs work, and both designs have pros and cons to them.  The new rain barrel has such a poor design that I am returning it and ordering a different one! 

When I lamented to my fellow green friend in Minneapolis about how difficult it is to find a barrel that meets all of my criteria, she said she wanted my criteria list.  (She's wanting rain barrels herself.)  I wrote up a list -- surprised myself at how much was on it, and emailed it to her.  She said I should flip it into a blog post.  And so, behold: 

What I've learned about Rain Barrels

Main Spigot location:  Just be aware of where it is in relation to the bottom of the barrel. If it's totally as low to the bottom of the barrel as it can be, it can be challenging to attach a hose. Optimal is 2-3 inches from the base so that you have some working room. Another solution to this is to have your barrel on a stand of some kind. Some are sold with matching stands, or you can use cement blocks, etc. to lift them up. Of course, the higher off the ground the barrel is, the better your water pressure.

A few barrels come with a second spigot halfway up the side of the barrel for filling watering cans. I don't see the need -- you can just use your attached hose. I don't think they would stick out far enough, anyway, to reach the mouth of the watering can, but I could be wrong.

Main hose attachment: e.g. ideally you want this to be a threaded spigot :  Some of my barrels have the hose attaching to the barrel by slipping a raw/cut end of a hose over a nipple and then the hose is clamped onto the nipple. In my experience, the hose falls off when the water pressure is too great and if you tug "just right" on the hose when using it. Your shoes … get very wet. I also like having an off/on control right on the barrel (as opposed to only at the end of the hose where you are watering plants) because if you want to swap out hoses you don’t lose all your water. Key, I tell you. Key. Live and learn.  Two of my barrels have a split spigot -- I can connect two hoses at once.  Convenient.

Overflow spout: type and location:  You really want this to be a port you can control -- i.e. again, ideally it is threaded with an on/off control. Why? So that you attach a hose to simply direct where the overflow water is going to end up, or you can either attach a hose to link to another barrel.

Where your rain barrel will be, and what your access to it will be, will determine the best location for the overflow: front, back or side. (I've determined that you can add a spout for this too -- we learned how in the Earth Day rain barrel workshop we attended. Not difficult with the right tools.)

Open/Closed system:  To me this means, does the whole lid come off for cleaning or water pump installation (for either controlling bacteria or pumping the water out) or do you only have access by sticking your arm only through the top area where the water drops in? I have both kinds. So far I haven't had to take the whole lid off and crawl inside for anything, but it's something to be aware of. Most barrels sold are closed systems. The re-purposed food container barrels are usually open -- which I think is my preference.

Lid Design:  Pay attention to the shape of the lid. Does it have an area that will (unintentionally) hold water? (Can you say, "mosquito breeding ground"?) Some of mine do (and some don't) and for the ones that do, I've drilled drainage holes in it so it drips down into the barrel.  Mosquitoes need 3-4 days of consistently standing water to breed...  (UPDATE:  If the barrel is full, the holes don't help; the water has no where to go.)

Don't bother with the barrels that purport to have a little area in the lid for planting a plant to make the whole barrel appear to be a gargantuan plant pot. In my experience, the space isn't big enough for enough dirt to support a plant. Or maybe I've just tried the wrong types of plants …

Hoses:  Longer is better. Two of my barrels came with 4 foot hoses. Not the most functional. They work for filling watering cans, but I can't reach to water my garden or beds to water directly. I'll be replacing those.

For my other 3 barrels, I bought a 45 foot hose and cut it into 3-15 foot pieces. Then I bought an adapter that turns a raw hose end into a threaded hose end, and put a no-kink adapter with an on/off function on it on the end of that. The no-kink adapter thingy has metal spiral covering about 4 inches of the hose.  About $5-7 each, but totally worth it to have one on each end of the hose. (Red and I spent a crazy long time in Home Depot hose department figuring out how many of what kinds of hose connectors to buy to meet my needs. Still didn't get it quite right and I need to go buy more. It just shouldn't be that hard...but somehow, it is.)

Support/Location:  Most barrels are 50 gallons. 50 gallons of water weighs 417 pounds. Be sure you have a solid footing under your barrel or it may tip over. (And break off the nearby house spigot, causing you to call a plumber in the middle of the night. IJS)  Also in that vein, unless you want to drain it to move it, choose a location that you are committed to … you simply cannot move them full! I built a wheeled square to put one on, which was great, except that I didn't have a concrete pad to roll it around on -- just dirt -- and of course the wheels just sunk into the dirt. Waste of time, that was!

All of that being said, I do really love my rain barrels. It's amazing how fast they fill up, and how long it takes to empty them! Saving me a fortune.  My roofs collects well over 715 gallons when it rains once inch.  That is a LOT.  They are rarely empty.  There is something therapeutic about hand watering baby plants with a watering can of rain water... even my dog prefers to drink water ouf the rain barrels versus out of the tap or garden hose.  She knows...

Click here to read about the benefits of collecting and using rain water and to get the calculation for how much rain your roof could be collecting:  http://www.conservemc.org/rainbarrelbenefits.htm

Oh, My Poor Baby Gutters

I am so sorry.  Spring is coming, I promise.  And, cute new little steel tables with great legs to support your rain barrels..

What's in my head today?

I haven't gotten a telephone call from my steel fabricator yet, calling to schedule my back steps installation.  I am antsy.   My head is full of backyard project dreams.  I have tried staring at various telephones, willing them to ring.  Alas.  The holes for the recessed footings are filling up with leaves.  They are like backyard booby traps:  if you didn't know they were there you could easily step in and break an ankle ...  although really they are knee deep not ankle deep.  Can you break a knee?

I do still need to clean off the tops of the steel plates; they have a little concrete residue on them.  I'm told it will scrape off with a putty knife, and then to use the garden hose and a dish scrubber.  But it's too cold to do that task these days.  For me, anyway.  Now if installation was scheduled, you can bet that I'd be out there in rubber gloves.

The colder weather has made the wild birds that I feed a little demanding.  They are plowing through the seed in my feeder.  I have chickadees, a pair of tufted titmouse, a female cardinal and sparrows.  Yesterday I had a huge ladderback woodpecker on my squirrel-proof seed feeder.  He could sit on one perch, and crane his neck around to the other side where his weapon-like beak would spear a nut.  Sort of a feeder hog.  I put out my spiral in-the-shell peanut feeder for him, but as long as I watched he didn't see it and figure it out.  I forgot about it this morning -- the squirrels will have a field day with it today! 

The water in my birdbath was frozen this morning.  As I waited for the dog to come in I saw a little sparrow sitting on the rim -- pecking at the ice.  Suddenly cold wasn't an issue for me.  I got a pitcher of water and went out without a coat to pour in the fresh water.  Scampered back in the house and watched and waited.  It didn't take the little guy even 2 minutes and he was back, drinking thirstily.

From the pouring of the footings, I have a large area of exposed dirt in my yard -- of course, right outside my back door -- that is where back steps go -- that has become a mud slide.  Yes, we had rain this weekend.  We needed it, and I am grateful for it.  But oh the mud.  And the large mud loving dog.  And the hardwood floors.  La la la la la!  I have had to just close the virtual door to my kitchen in my mind.  Until the mud dries, there's no point in mopping.

I did spread out my last bale of straw over the mud yesterday, in an attempt to contain it.  Wouldn't that have been a smart thing to do the day before it rained??  It's not as though I didn't know rain was coming.

And because all conversations about rain turn to rain barrels... of my five rain barrels, two of the backyard ones are currently not even under downspouts!  Oh the horror!  They have been cast aside... waiting for their fabulous steel supports.  The hose on the front barrel had come loose but I have repaired it -- so theoretically it should have caught rain.  I haven't checked it.  And the two huge blue barrels from the Earth Day workshop are steadfastly working.  It will be okay.  There will be more rain.  :::grin:::  Seriously, if these are the worst of my worries...

Rain Barrel Footings & An Empty Wine Rack

These are the small footings for the rain barrel that stands alone on the opposite corner on the back of the house:

 They are 8" square, and 4" tall.  They will support a small steel table upon which the rain barrel will sit.  They will be embedded into one large concrete pad, as opposed to 4 small ones.

I'm a little bit twitchy these days about my rain barrels.  Two of the 5 had to be emptied so that Vic could move them.  A third one, when our weather got cold, the hose came loose and the whole thing drained.  I knew the connection was bad, but had been procrastinating repairing it, so I suppose I am to blame for that one.  But I am down from about 275 gallons of water to 110.... for some reason that's akin to not having enough good books in the house to read, or having a wine rack that is less than full...

Raspberry Canes

You may recall this post
 http://my1929tudor.blogspot.com/2010/04/they-will-be-berry-berry-good.html from back in April wherein I posted about planting raspberry canes.  I'm sad to report that only 4 of those canes appear to have lived.  (I hold out hope that some are dormant and will sprout back to life in the Spring.)  My excuses are that we had summer heat very early this Summer... and I didn't water them enough.  And when I got the new fence I miscalculated the increased amount of sun in that part of the yard -- too much, I think. 

But!  Good news:  I am fortunate enough to have another chance -- my sister visited from Minnesota over Halloween weekend, and for my hostess gift she brought me 18 raspberry canes from her garden.  Awesomeness!  They are the from the same canes that are at mom and dad's, the ones that were brought over from Finland.

When my sister arrived we liberated the canes from the giant Ziploc in her suitcase and put them in a bucket of rain water from my barrel.  They had been in there for a week so this weekend it was time to get them in the ground.   Project time!  (I have so many projects in my head right now it's insane...)

Red and I went to Home Depot and rented a rototiller -- I was positively giddy about it -- frankly nearly purchased one but was able to divert -- and toted it home.  The guy at the rental counter was knowledgeable and helpful but yowser -- he tracked about 2 conversation topics behind the entire time.  

Next I took Red's truck and went to Redenta's to get compost.  I love the Living Earth Technologies organic compost (http://www.livingearth.net/) and Bucky at Redenta's advised that for the square footage I was working with that I would probably need 6 bags.  I added a bag of Bed Prep to that, which includes earth worm castings.  Gold, baby, gold!  Toted all that home.

When I got home, Red had already started tilling.  He'd done the most difficult part, which is making the first passes through ground that had not ever been tilled.  It didn't have grass growing on it  -- bonus -- but it was fairly well packed.  I did a pass through it, and then dragged the tiller aside to start adding soil amendments.

In went the following:
3 bags of LET Organic Compost
2 wheelbarrows worth of my very own compost from my compost tumbler
1 bags of mulched dry leaves (great nitrogen, which raspberries love)

And then we tilled again.  We reminisced about the similar equipment rental at my lake property... laughed...

Then I added the three remaining bags of compost, another batch of mulched leaves, and the bag of bed prep.  Talk about some beautiful soil!

I was so pleased that my home made compost was successful!  I had just said to Red earlier in the weekend that I needed to do a better job on my compost tumbler, and that maybe I would get an earth worm farm for my kitchen scraps instead.  But then I opened it up and found I had some great compost.  I know I could still improve my method for it, but it did look great.  It's also nice to have the older barrel empty going into winter.

I staggered the canes about 2 feet apart, stuck in flags so I wouldn't lose any, and hand watered each plant with rain water, and  topped it all off with 6 bags of cedar mulch.  I vow to do better on the watering, plus the cooler weather will help.  As I was kneeling in the dirt, planting, Red shouted from the driveway, "You look happy."  It was an awesome day.

Ohhhh Hermine!

This will shock you, but I think I may have to start a new project:  Building an ark. 

I got eight -- EIGHT -- weather-related emails overnight from the National Weather Service.  Oy!  Apparently they weren't anything life threatening, (which is good since I slept through their buzzing on my phone) because I awakened this morning all snug and dry in my bed.  No surprise here, but all I want to do is hang out somewhere on a covered patio or porch (not mine, because mine is very wet!) and watch the rain.  It's just divine!  My rain gauge tops out at 5" and when I left for work today it was nearly overflowing.  That is since yesterday morning... and it's supposed to rain all day today.  Speaking of work, I chose what to wear today by what shoes I have with the thickest soles... Makes me happy.  Makes me want more rain barrels -- as if 210 gallons isn't enough -- but makes me happy.

I got the 2 largest of my dining room walls painted yesterday afternoon and evening.  With the wall texture, and the paint color, my walls look EXACTLY like a pan of my mother's brownies.  Strange, yes, but true.  Honestly, it made me crave brownies.  Her brownies.  And, I happen to know that last week she baked a double batch because 3 of my sisters were going to be home over this past weekend.  Lucky dogs.

Giddy

We got rain last night, and all four of my rain barrels are over flowing! That's over 200 GALLONS of water. Oh, happy day!

For the 2 blue barrels, (I have 2 blue ones and two faux terra cotta ones) I plan to wrap them in burlap to disguise them. And I still need to level them on the cement blocks and "landscape away" the blocks. But they are full of water!!