5 Things to Start Harvesting Rain Off Your Roof
One inch of rain on a small roof is hundreds of gallons headed down the driveway. These five put a barrel of it between your gutter and the August hose ban.
The barrel itself
Fifty gallons of August insurance
The pick
RTS 50-Gallon Rain Barrel
$99.00 on Amazon
A summer storm fills a fifty-gallon barrel in minutes, and that is a week of container watering that never touched the meter - chlorine-free, sun-warmed, exactly what transplants prefer. A purpose-made barrel arrives with the spigot, overflow and screened lid already solved, which is most of the plumbing.
Food-grade recycled drums are the budget path if you enjoy fittings.
See it on AmazonA downspout diverter
The part that makes it automatic
The pick
Downspout Diverter Kit
$27.59 on Amazon
Cutting a downspout to dump straight into a barrel works until the barrel is full and overflowing against your foundation. A diverter tees into the spout, feeds the barrel until it is full, then sends the rest down the original pipe away from the house - set once, forget forever.
Match the kit to your spout size (2x3 vs 3x4) before ordering.
See it on AmazonA real stand
Gravity is your water pressure
The pick
RTS Rain Barrel Stand
$48.42 on Amazon
A barrel on the ground fills a watering can half way, slowly, from a spigot you cannot fit under. Two feet of height adds usable pressure and clearance - and a full barrel weighs over four hundred pounds, which is why the stand is not a pile of deck blocks that settles sideways into a slow-motion disaster.
Whatever it sits on: dead level, on tamped ground. Four hundred pounds.
See it on AmazonA soaker hose to spend it
Low pressure wants low-pressure tools
The pick
Linkable Soaker Hose, 50 ft
$18.96 on Amazon
Barrel pressure will not run sprinklers or fussy drip emitters, but it will weep perfectly through a porous soaker hose snaked among the tomatoes - open the spigot, let gravity spend an hour emptying the barrel exactly at the roots, close it. The barrel refills on the next rain and the cycle repeats.
Downhill from the barrel only - gravity does not negotiate.
See it on AmazonMosquito screening
A barrel is a nursery if you let it be
The pick
Barrel Mesh Covers, 2-Pack
$9.99 on Amazon
Open water plus summer equals mosquitoes in four days, and an unscreened barrel breeds them by the thousand. Fine mesh across every opening - inlet and overflow both - keeps the water an asset instead of a public nuisance, and filters the roof grit while it is at it.
A BTI dunk monthly is the belt to the screen's suspenders.
See it on AmazonAs an Amazon Associate, Story Thyme Farms earns from qualifying purchases, at no cost to you. It never changes what we recommend. Prices checked 2026-08-22 and will drift.