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I rigged up a water butt yesterday as I will need a good supply of rain water for my blueberry bushes and cranberry plants. It took me about 10 minutes, grabbing whatever I could find at hand. The water butt itself is a proper bin-sized black cylindrical bin and the water collects off the end of one side of the greenhouse by means of a plastic pot tab (the sort that has planting and care details on when you buy a plant from a garden centre) and fly-swat extension to the greenhouse gutter and all held in place with a clothes peg. After last night's rain the bin-butt was half full at 6am and is now about two-thirds full. However...

I realise that pretty soon the water in the butt is going to go stagnant and green with algae. Is it viable to add nettles (I don't knowingly have any comfrey in the garden) to the butt to rot down and produce a liquid fertiliser (and periodically hook out the old nettles and put them on the compost)? Or is it best to make liquid fertiliser in a separate container? Is it worth getting a second bin, or real butt, so that I can periodically swap and clean them?

Sound ingenious!

If you can cover the current bin/butt, that will stop the water going stagnant quickly, even better if it is not in full sun, and hopefully you should have enough need of the water in the garden during the long hot summer that you won't find it sitting around too long going green.

To create the concentration required you would need to really fill the butt with nettles to create the fertiliser, but the biggest disadvantage to that is that it STINKS!!!!!!! Really really really really bad smell.

I make mine in covered buckets then draw off into the sprayer for use.

Monika

Thanks for the advice AF. I'll give the idea of making fertiliser in the butt a big miss!

Here's a short video of the contraption in our (the others don't know about it yet!) new Transition Horsham YouTube account: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TGdR-KJp-a8



I have a lid for the bin, so I could move the bin and cap it when full and put another bin in place to collect the water.

You would do well to raise the bin from the floor on blocks and fit a tap so you can get the water out easily, if you place the lid on upside down and drill a small hole in the middle the water will run down into the hole and the evaporation would collect on the underside and drip back into the bucket during the hot days.

Brilliant tip about the lid! Thanks, I'll do that now.

I was planning on lifting water out in a bucket from this bin. If I get a second one, I'll get another bin or a water butt, depending on which is cheapest and whether I want to continue with lifting the water out rather than running it through.

Try Freecycle, we got one from a lovely lady who had recently bought a new one to replace her old manky one, a quick wipe down with a cloth and it's brilliant :D



Some people's idea of manky is some other peoples idea of pristine ;)

We haven't even hooked it up to the drain pipe yet and it's already giving us enough water for all our window boxes :D

Hi
Congratulations on your new achievement. Keep the greenhouse roof and gutter clear of algae, leaves and dead flies. This will stop the debris ending up in the water butt and turning it stagnant.

A short piece of copper wire inside will prevent midge larvae from taking up residence.

Your best option is simply to use the water quickly and not leave it lying about.

Cheers
Zoe

I did a 'make you own' water butt 2 years ago after that really dry April- incidentally the day after I did it rained almost non stop for 2 years...

I felt really proud of myself! I was very glad I'd put it on a few layers of bricks, I didn't with the allotment one and gettign teh water out in buckets is fiddly and anoying when you are in a rush (always) and still an option anyway if its only on a few bricks btu also gives you the tap at the bottom option.

I didn't give it an overflow coz I wanted all the water (not knowing how much it was going to rain) so there does need to be contingency there!

I didn't give it a lid, thought it might suffer stagent gunge but actually I celaned it out last week for the first time and it wasn't too bad at all. It was the first time it has been empty for me to clean it!

Amazing how much water you can use with plants. so congratulations indeed.

I would definitely have a lid on anything you inted making fertilizer tea coz it really does hum, unless you want you neighbours to move out in case make one up, go on holiday for a month and return with a gas mask to find the area deserted

I'm really far less impressed with my efforts on teh allotment, the guttering keeps blowing off the shed and teh water seems to blow away before falling into the butt, which is lower, and there is a hose guiding it into the butt at home but it just falls (or not) into the butt off the guttering from the shed. I'd recommend the hose to maximise what you can collect for those dry periods.

So there's the ramblings of my water butt experience for what they are worth!

Following CP's suggestion, I have added the lid



and now videoed it in action

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y-ZzLNmT3C8 - watch me grope and fumble in the rain with my free hand as I squint through the opaque misted viewer of my camera, feel for the holes and triumphantly point at one of them!

BTW, does fertiliser tea keep cats away?

Looks great, glad it's working for you :D

Small suggestion is to cable tie the lid on at least one side just in case of high winds ;)

Ah yes strong winds.....we put a brick in the bottom of the one thats a distbin as its light enough to fly when empty otherwise!

I bought a couple of clips that keep tablecloths in place and use them to keep my water butt lid in place. It works well. I find the tap that came with the butt is hopelessly slow and also leaks. I used to just fill my watering cans from the top but thinking about it, this seems an ideal way of doing some serious lower back damage so I now have a new strategy, a submersible pump in the butt connected to a hose which them pumps water to the distant corners of my garden. My pumpkins can outdrink Ernest Hemmingway!

Two things here to think about, (1) I use comphrey in my water butt as its one of the best free and safe ways to feed your plants, (2) I used an old push bike wheel covered it with chicken wire and placed it back on the water but, this way of covering the butt lets rain back in, lets the smell escape, and stops birds trying to drink (if water butt used for water only) and falling in and drownding.

I have one butt covered, one uncovered. I've noticed that the uncovered one has a lots of seeds floating on the top (dandelion or similar). As I plan to use the water to water my garden, it is probably not wise to use seedy water so I'll skim off the seeds - until I get a new lid.
I have decided not to add a photograph of my uncovered butt.

foodinistar wrote:I rigged up a water butt yesterday as I will need a good supply of rain water for my blueberry bushes and cranberry plants. It took me about 10 minutes, grabbing whatever I could find at hand. The water butt itself is a proper bin-sized black cylindrical bin and the water collects off the end of one side of the greenhouse by means of a plastic pot tab (the sort that has planting and care details on when you buy a plant from a garden centre) and fly-swat extension to the greenhouse gutter and all held in place with a clothes peg. After last night's rain the bin-butt was half full at 6am and is now about two-thirds full. However...

I realise that pretty soon the water in the butt is going to go stagnant and green with algae. Is it viable to add nettles (I don't knowingly have any comfrey in the garden) to the butt to rot down and produce a liquid fertiliser (and periodically hook out the old nettles and put them on the compost)? Or is it best to make liquid fertiliser in a separate container? Is it worth getting a second bin, or real butt, so that I can periodically swap and clean them?

put a lid on it - we have 6 butts [tehehe], 4 of which are lidded, and the water is SO clear its untrue.

also, i think you can buy barley or something? comes netted, and you weigh it down, its supposed to stop the algae, but i dont think it worked in ours