Thursday, July 19, 2012

Cloud burst !!


Monday we'd gotten 1/2" of rain and I saved what I could in the water barrels.

Wednesday we got another 1/4".

Today...  Oh today!    Around 11:15 we got a really nice downpour for 20 minutes.  The temps dropped into the high 60s and we got 1/2" of rain.   YAY YAY!  Then I checked the radar and saw that we juuust might get another shower in a while.  Hmmm.

There was only space for another 20-25 gallons or so in the 3 barrels by the garage.  If we get more than a brief shower, I'd miss the opportunity to catch it.  So between sprinkles I hustled back to the shed and brought up the 6th (and last) rain barrel.  It was all cut and cleaned - ready to go.  I set it up to catch the garage runoff.

Then I went  back to the shed where I quickly baled out half of each of the 2 barrels into 2 empty 32-gallon compost bins.  That way, should we get more than a shower, the barrels would have room to catch it all.  There.   Now we wait. 

And there it came.  Slowly at first, then a little harder, and then lots of rolling THUNDER and another little cloud burst.  It didn't last long, but it gave us .3"  Total - .8"  Jeeze.  That's more rain than we've gotten in the past 19 days!   And I caught it ALL.

So right now I'm sitting on 395 gallons of rainwater!   I feel like I've won a lottery.  Add in the cool temps (which won't last - the sun is coming out now) and it's like money in the bank!  I'm actually a little giddy.  Temporary?  Sure.  But for now -- what a wonderful respite from the broiling temps and parched weather.

Hope you fellow Ohio gardeners caught some of this today.  :-D

6 comments:

  1. Answered prayer! I'm happy for you and you are so wise to use rain barrels.
    Hugs, Beth

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    1. Hi Beth! This is my first year with the rain barrels so I'm probably posting a lot of my water adventures because of it. By next year I'm sure they will just be part of the gardens, but right now I'm very 'into' them. And now that they are all nearly full, I'm very excited. Thanks for stopping by. :-D

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  2. Woo-hoo for you!! Happy Dance!! When all my barrels are full I can capture almost as much as you - 356 gallons. I'm so glad it cooled off and rained!

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    1. Yepper. I'm dancin' happy! :-D It never even got out of the mid-60s today (Friday) and it was cloudy all day so the rain didn't get baked right off. I didn't even have to water anything. Ahhhhhhh. Hope you're getting some break in the weather too.

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  3. rain?
    welcome to the last three months in the UK!

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    1. Hello John. :-D We've had some cool weather and a bit of rain for a change. I hope it's been reciprocated your way with some sun and warmth?

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