Safe guarding my rain barrels from Mosquitoes

This post will be part of a three series event where I will highlight other harmful issues caused by rain barrels if certain precautions are not taken in the construction of the barrels.

A question was asked about my idea of building rain barrels. In a nutshell my reader asked what is the point of a rain barrel if it will cause mosquito infestations in my yard? GREAT QUESTION!

As I have indicated I am a family man, so I have many small children running around, plus my animals. One of the biggest concerns with this number of small things running around the yard is a possible infestation of mosquitoes in my yard. Not only are they a nuisance to adults they can also be deadly, even more to my children and animals! This has been a concern that I looked into since taking on the idea of building the rain barrels. I mean why fix one thing if it causes something worse? 

Before we get into how I plan to safeguard let me share a little story with you that I like to call "You my larva's daddy"

As you can see in the Life Cycle those devil little blood suckers actually have a neat little life.  I do not know about the logistics of the bugs breeding practices, but let's assume this is how it goes >> Mr. Mosquito and Ms. Sucker go out cruising the sky one night. During this little escapade Mr. Mosquito decides to make the moves on Ms. Sucker and sparks fly (on your arm of course!)

Or maybe it was like this

Who knows? All I know is the bite itches!

Following this night of romantic passages Mr. Mosquito receives a phone call from Ms. Sucker (use your imagination people!) telling him that she's pregnant and he is the daddy! Mr. Mosquito tells her there is no way and that he demands a blood test to prove it is his! As time passes it soon comes the time to give birth. Ms. Sucker has given up on getting help from Mr. Mosquito due to his lack of communication. Plus it didn't help when Ms. Sucker and the Misquitette gang did a drive by buzzing at his house and scared his mother to death, literally!

So the big day has finally come to release the new mosquitoes into the world so Ms. Sucker and her gang of friends went searching for some water. When they found this water Ms. Sucker squatted down and pushed those babies out. Once she does this she is so distraught about bringing daddyless mosquitoes into the world, so her and her gang fly to the front porch of the neighbors house.

Once there they huff some OFF! and get wild and decide to see how bad it can be when you fly into the forbidden blue buzzing light. It was at this time they met their electric demise and made the front page of the Mosquito Times the following day under the headlines "Innocent group commits suicide while under the influence of street drug OFF!"

So now we have these little baby mosquito larva in this pool of water where they live for some time underwater. While living under water they use their little demon sucker mouth pieces to poke through the top of the water to get some air. This continues until the little devils are big enough to break free from their watery larva at which time they fly to find the next innocent victim to torment and then the cycle continues over and over again! 

THE END

So, through my research I have found that there are a few different things that one can do to prevent a mosquito infestation. The first thing to do, which is the thing I plan to do, is to not give the mosquito access to the water to lay the lava. I plan on doing this by securing all pipes into the barrels securely and using nylons as well as silicone caulk to prevent a access point. I also plan to have overflow points at the top of my barrels with pipes that will lead away from the barrel to a ditch or field. I also plan on making sure my gutters remain clean by checking them at least every other week and placing a screen over the gutter down pipe inside the gutter. This will all be documented with pictures when I construct my rain barrel systems!

Other possible remedies are to use a mixture of vegetable oil and water and create an oil slick. This will prevent the bugs from being able to stick their little suckers up through the water to get access to air. 

One other thing to do is when you see that you have a mosquito infestation drain your barrels and start over. This can be a game changer if you are counting on that water and there is no rain in the forecast so it is best to simply take precautions so you do not have to deal with this problem!

The most important thing to remember is to make sure you have everything properly sealed and to make sure your overflow does not simply pool up right at your barrels! Or if you choose to use an open top system make sure that you have a screen down over the top and have your overflow below the top to prevent the water from rising above the screen. 

Earning my bones

I received an email today about my ad for the barrels. I have a person that is supposed to come by tomorrow afternoon and buy 3 of them. This means that I will have already paid for my barrels! Now I need to sell the rest so I can have my rain barrels for free! 

In order to break even on all materials I will need to be right around $80. When I hit that amount, whatever I make over that I will put towards my next project. I have three things in mind that will be perfect for the upcoming months. 

The first thing in mind is to establish some way for curing meat. This can be a somewhat easy task, but I have to take a lot of precautions! I will cover those once we get to that project!

The next thing I have in mind is building a small greenhouse. This will be perfect for housing my herbs and vegetables during the colder months of the year. This project would require some funds and a great deal of time. I was given some plans on how to build one for rather cheap, which I will share with all of you when the time is right! 

Then there is the third idea, establish a clean heating system in my outdoor workshop. Currently I have a natural gas powered heater. I plan to do away with that all together and use only a wood stove to heat my garage. I have the stove already, I just need to hook it up.

I will decide on which project to do when the time comes. I will also listen to my readers. What would you like to see me do? 

The planning has begun but the drought is causing some concerns

Today I took the time to go to my locations for my rain-barrels. Due to the extreme drought conditions of my land I am not sure of the stability of the ground once the rain-barrel system is in place. It is important to remember that each barrel will weigh right above 450 lbs when full and I do not want the barrels sinking my blocks into the ground. This scenario can be a tragedy in two ways (1) I damage the ground at the location and will be forced to move my set up to a different location and (2) the barrels could tip over causing damage to the barrels, the building or God forbid one of my children.

So now I come to a crossroads where I must decide if I am going to use sand to level the ground and hope that it will also strengthen the ground, lay a layer of concrete or place the blocks on the hardened ground and hope that it remains stable when rains take place and the weight pushes down.

I think I will explore the idea of using a concrete base but this will cost me more money!! 

This idea will be pondered on some more tomorrow. I am setting my plans to begin the construction of the rain barrel system for this weekend! With or without the concrete foundation!

Dancing Rabbit Ecovillage

This is a really neat thing these people have here! This is a group of people who have done something REAL! I found this while googleing around today and then saw it was covered by the Owl Creek Gazette.

Watch the video and surf around their site which can be found here Dancing Rabbit Ecovillage.

While you are surfing around notice the location. I think as my project progresses I will travel there for a weekend, to try and learn more ways to be self-reliant. 

Enjoy

Owl Creek Gazette

This is a cool magazine that I found at the super market today. There were some really neat articles in it. AND IT WAS FREE!

You can find their blog here

Owl Creek Gazette

One article that drew me in the most was "The Power and Beauty of Wind". This was a Q & A article about, you guessed it, wind turbines. One line really caught my eye! 

"A word of caution here - this is not a project to be taken on by the weekend warrior - leave it to the qualified electricians and installers"

I can see what they would mean here, this can be a dangerous project, I mean you ARE working with electricity, but can't a single person take it upon themselves to study the ins & outs of a wind turbine and build their own? Maybe it's just a way to make sure people stay in business. What if 50 families in my area attempted to take on the task of being a little more self-reliant? It might lead to people being laid off, that's what could happen, but honestly, I do not think we have to worry about this, counting on others is so much more relaxing!   

All-in-all this magazine was very informative, and it's not only about being self-reliant energy wise. There are many other articles that highlight business owners that are interviewed about how they built their business, a great article on how to make sourdough bread and another section with some recipes. There is another article that was very informative about how to publish your own book.

I will read it again and I hope you check it out just to see if it fits your taste!

Did I mention it is FREE?

Funny trip with the barrels.

Today to get the barrels we had to travel into one of the more urban areas, which is about 40 miles from my house. When we got there the first thing that popped into my mind was, "I sure could go for a coffee." Why would that thought come to mind? 

Well the labels on the barrels told it all! 

Caramel and Vanilla flavoring and LOTS of it! So we loaded them up and tied them down and started our journey which included a stop a Lowes to pick up our other supplies. While we are driving you can smell the flavoring in the truck, so I can only imagine how the cars behind us felt. 

Wonder what people were thinking was being done with all of these barrels?

While we are parked at Lowes the whole parking lot was smelling like coffee, then when we drive to the pickup door every person that walked by was reading the labels. Now this Lowes is only a few city blocks from a Starbucks, so if a Starbucks employee is reading this and you had a massive rush of people today that were telling you that something just made them want a coffee, you're welcome!

The best part was after the barrels were unloaded I had to return the trailer to the owner and while I was talking to him he asked what it was that he was smelling. He then guessed it to be a caramel smell. He hit it dead on and the barrels had been off of his trailer for about an hour already!

A day of gathering

I spent the day today gathering materials for the rain barrel project. This required some travel but not much and in the end it will be worth it on two different fronts. The first benefit is I will be able to harvest rain water and begin my journey to self reliance. This material pick-up did turn out to be a little pricier that I thought it would be that is where number two comes into play. I was able to get 20 barrels for 20 dollars. Now one thing I found out when searching for rain barrel was that they are rather pricey. So this will be where I benefit. Since getting those massive babies home, which is a story in its own; it popped into my mind that I can mark up the remaining barrels 90% and still not be above other asking prices for used barrels. I might have to store them go a while but if I can sell the 12 I will not use for $120 I will not only get my rain barrel set up for free, I will have additional money to apply to other projects! 

So there we are more than enough to play with!

I wish that would have been the only money I needed to spend for this project to be successful but it wasn't. There are many components to the rain barrel system, which was detailed in the Water Barrel Materials Post. For the other materials I went to my local Lowes. After purchasing the additional materials that included cinder blocks and various PVC pipe and pipe fittings my total out of pocket cost for materials was $73 and some change. Well minus a few dollars for a couple sodas and candy for my little helper, but hey no labor is free these days! 

I am using 1/2 inch PVC 

For each set up which will consist of 2 barrels I will use the following 1 T, 1 90 Elbow, 2 Male and 2 Female adapter pieces, a shut off valve and a gutter adapter. 

Also with all of that I have some scraps that were in my shed that I will use for the overflow and the trip from the gutter to the barrel. 

Recycled goods!

Then the final components of the project that I got today were the cinder blocks. I got 16 of them and plan to use 4 per barrel. Just in case you do not know what cinder blocks are here is a picture for you. 

Now that I have all of the materials minus the pressure treated 4x4's I can do some dry runs with the layout and see how I would like to set up the future rain harvesting systems.