Very excited to have a garden going this Spring. I have enclosed the garden in and have bought about 40 bags of topsoil and supplements (compost and manure and stuff) and will probably be working all these things into the garden space over this weekend. Lots of fun. I’m hoping we bought enough to have a good base for our garden. Deep enough for the roots of the tomatoes and other plants to not have to dig through the clay, but find substantial nutrients and space in the new soil I am building. Ultimately, I’ll draw the line at a certain number of bags of soil – and perhaps if it is mediocre this year, next year we’ll shoot for stellar.

Finally got around to getting some pictures together of our rain barrel. Here it is.

I feel this is a solid design because the overflow will not risk rotting out the wood or moving dirt from around our house. It will flow right back into the systems in place to move that water down to the road.

Benefits

Naturally the benefits of having this rain barrel are two-fold. The first benefit is that the rain water will be good for my garden. This barrel has been strategically placed so that it will be easy to use a hose, or fill a watering can and place this natural element to the soil of the garden. Secondly, we help erosion control because the capturing of this water means that it is not flowing into storm drains, and consequently, not continuing to wash away the soil along the river edge. I used to not think this was a big deal but sudden surges in the local rivers are directly caused by runoff from roads and neighborhoods. My capturing of 55 gallons won’t be a significant help, but it can’t hurt.