Thu, 2009-06-11 09:52 — panderson03
Not sure if anyone out there is as in to rain barrels as I am. I've wanted one such a long time but they are SO EXPENSIVE; most places charge 100-150 dollars each!!! are they made of gold or what!?
anyway, through the Extension service of the University of Minnesota, I found a place in New Hope that sells used 55 gallong plastic barrels for $20!!! these can be EASILY modified create rain barrels! I'm thrilled and bought 2!
anyway the contact info for the container place is below. the only down side as they WILL NOT SHIP...they are pick-up only
Western Container New Hope
(612) 338-2413 www.bargaincontainer.com
55-gallon, closed-top, blue, plastic barrels for
$20.00. Pick up only.
Comments
Awesome!
Thanks for the info! I'll look into picking one up. New Hope is practically in my back yard (not really, but sort of)! I have a new garden so it needs tons of water.
Melinda
Congrats on your find! I,
Congrats on your find! I, too, am looking for them. They go for $75 give or take around Asheville, but the big blue plastic barrels that many folks use for them I'm told are given away at the local apple juice plant. I've been gearing up to stack so too busy to look into it....but I do hope to get mine for free.
rain barrels
Wow, I didnt think they were that much.I can get the 55 gal barrels from work for nothing and as many as i want.They are blue and thick plastic.
Tim
rain barrels
Tim
you are LUCKY!
rain barrels
MELINDARAY, so where are you buidling and when? We won't be stacking logs til 2011; doing basement in late 2010. we'll be building up north near Fergus Falls. by the way, if you use your rain barrel to capture water running off your roof THEY DON'T suggest you water your fruit/vegetable garden with it. something about asbestos in the roofing.... Anyway, I'll be using mine to water the lawn and the flower garden
JAYK, FREE is SO much better than $20!! I'll have to call our local orchard and see if they can point me toward an apple juice factory! and by the way, congratulations on being at the 'stacking' phase! we're really looking forward to it...and NOT looking forward to peeling....oh well. its all part of the adventure!
thanks!!
rain barrel update!
In Minneapolis there's a place call reuse center
http://www.greeninstitute.org/StoreSales.htm
They have a lot of stuff that is salvaged from places being torn down. they claim "25,000 square feet of quality salvaged and surplus building materials'
they have rainbarrels that I hear are 120 gallon!
-Complete with spigots, overflow valves, and downspout filters to prevent clogging and mosquitos
-Plastic $80; Wood $190
I'm getting one!
Go Fish...
Wed, 2009-09-16 00:08
A good friend of ours had rain barrels set up on her shed to water her garden and she would toss in a few cheap goldfish (the 20 cent feeder type from walmart) into the barrel at the beginning of summer to eat any mosquito larva or other bugs. Worked great as they are very hardy fish and dont mind temperature swings. The barrels are deep enough that on very hot days they just swim toward the bottom where the water is cooler.
Just a thought.
DocJ
go fish
What a great idea! too bad my rainbarrels aren't clear; the cats would LOVE watching the gold fish (the neighborhood kids would love it too!!). what we did was secure a lenght of screen over the whole in the top that the rain from the down spout flows in to. so what does she do with teh gold fish in the winter? We live in Minnesota and the rain barrel would have to be PRETTY deep for the gold fish to survive our winters here:)
on a different not, found that 1 55 gal rain barrel per drain spout was just not enough. are working on connecting 2 per drain spout. we'll see how that goes....
Southern Oregon goldfish...
We have a homemade fountain that is based on 1/2 of a 55 gallon drum and our goldfish survive the winters. Not quite Minnesota weather (we hit 0 for a day or two at a time) but then our goldfish don't get all those Minnesota mosquitoes to fatten up on either.
South Central Oregon
With the mosquitos on my property, the goldfish would turn into Great White Sharks by the end of summer. But half my property is protected wetlands. I bought Bat homes and will install them later this year. I love to watch bats and they ought to get very fat around my area. I hope they don't turn into giant Condors.
Oregon BloodSuckers
Thu, 2010-09-23 13:56
Oh Yeah?
You think you got Skeeters?
We get em year round, except, of course, in the summer ... when it's so freakin hot they spontaneously combust in midair ...
And you darn well know that everything's bigger in Texas ... Heck, last week I had a dozen of the suckers try to carjack me at a stoplight.
I was in Cass Lake once...
And shot a skeeter that was so big that one hindquarter fed our family for 4 months... But then, when I was a kid and lived in League City, Texas we had em so thick that we used to catch em and weave their legs together to form mosquito nets that were so strong that they would have even kept those Minnesota Skeeters at bay. Dang O heck I LOVE Southern Oregon!
Bats n bugs...
Panderson, Look into
Panderson, Look into gambusia minnows and mosquito dunks for mosquito control.
http://www.kens-fishfarm.com/c-18-gambusia-minnows.aspx
http://www.planetnatural.com/site/mosquito-dunks.html
Ed K. , You should go into the guano business. That stuff is expensive.
gambusia minnows
thanks greenthumb I definitely will do that!
Adventurer Hey guys does
Wed, 2009-09-16 09:36
Adventurer
Hey guys does anyone know hown long the logs are for the Dale family's log home? Its in the student built pics. I really want to build with that style roof to get more lenght.
Thanks for your input. adventurer