Applied Ecological Design

Year in Review

2011-10-22T15:33:00.000-07:00

Eight pictures for eight months.

Preping the site for grading and paths in what we're calling the "farm area". (It's difficult to see at the moment with plants in seasonal transition and nearly everything ripped out and piled up in the picture. We've estimated the location of paths, now we're ready to finish the grading and add compost.)

Sunchokes!

A strange and beautiful insect (I still need to figure out what it is. I saw it regularly throughout the summer, only on this Sedum.)

Some of the wheat/rye mix I planted last Fall came back in the spring so we kept it.

As it turns out, our wheat/rye (which was it?), was a beautiful addition to our landscape. It kept the ground covered, shown bright in the sunlight, and waved around in the wind, adding movement that most of our other plants cannot do.

Excavating for a path around the strawberries and cold frame. (It is now complete, and very comfortable; pictures to come.)

Everybody remember the Blizzard of February 2011? Of course. Here's a visual reminder so you can prepare for the next; it's projected that Winter 2011 will be much like last year, with the same amount of snowfall.

Finally, have you ever wondered what landscape architects do in the Winter? On that particular day, I went skiing.

Sidewalk - Project Summary

2010-10-13T18:04:00.000-07:00

The New Entrance. I like to think of it as a well-done face lift, and in a few months, nobody will ever remember a time when it looked differently.

The new entrance (just one!)

A three-picture summary of two major projects, the White Pine 'Deconstruction' and the Sidewalk Reconstruction.

May 10, 2010

October 11, 2010

The Berm. Oh dear, I made a berm. It makes me think of suburbia, er, subermia? Not in this case. The arc and slope created by this berm is part of the new site engineering. The berm will collect and direct stormwater from the roof and send it to the rain garden. This will protect the house from water seepage and will irrigate the plants that arrive in Spring.

The berm.

Seed and Straw. A cover crop has been planted to protect the exposed soil. I used a mix of agricultural plants - Wheat, Rye, Buckwheat, and Oats - because they all can be turned into the soil as 'green manure'. Over the seeds is laid a fine layer of straw to protect the seeds from dehydration and hungry birds.

Straw mulch, watered daily.

Finally, I'd like to point out our subterranean friends, the Cicada Nymphs. I exposed several while digging the soil the grade the site.

Cicada nymph, posing next to the hole he was in.

More info on Cicadas:

Cicadas are among the most benign of insects. Neither the root-sucking nymphs nor the adults do any significant damage to trees or other plants.
Though some species are called annual cicadas because they are present every year, all species take at least four years to mature in the ground.
Nymphs grow gradually through eight stages before maturity.

[This Cicada information came from Mass Audobon.]

The Chicago Botanic Garden mentions:

Cicadas are edible....but recent research has determined that cicadas may contain high levels of mercury...and diners are cautioned to limit their ingestion of these "delicacies" to just a few.

I guess my small urban farm kitchen can add another item to it's menu. Cicada Tempura anyone?

[By the way, during a locust invasion of biblical proportions while serving as a Peace Corps Volunteer in The Gambia, locals refused to eat the large, juicy locusts even when it meant literally saving their livelihood. I'll take a cue from them.]

"It's looking beautiful!"

2010-10-11T10:43:00.000-07:00

As I was documenting the site this morning, I received my first comment from a total stranger. A woman was running with her dog and as she passed, she removed her ear-buds and shouted to me "It's looking beautiful!"

THANKS!

Also, comments and analysis on the sidewalk project forthcoming.

Sidewalk Deconstruction & Reconstruction – Day 2

2010-10-08T15:12:00.000-07:00

The Front Yard, looking East, During & After

10/4, 12:08pm

10/5, 1:40pm

10/8, 2:18pm

What the neighbor's see, Before & After

10/4, 10:40am

10/5, 11:40am

Porch view, Before & After

10/4, 2:40pm

10/5, 3:03pm

Finally, an added joy to a project is the discovery of artifacts. Here's what we found:

Our sidewalk on the left (cut and moved), pre-existing sidewalk on the right (discovered below ours).

Note the relative 'thin-ness' of the horizontal piece in the middle, the pre-existing sidewalk, thought to be 50+ years old.

These two images show leaf prints found on the underside of one excavated piece of sidewalk. In contrast to every other piece, which was covered with chunks of old concrete, this one caught my attention! It appears we have imprints of leaves from two tree types, an American Elm and some kind of Maple.

Sidewalk Deconstruction & Reconstruction – Day 1

2010-10-04T15:20:00.000-07:00

At the crack of 7:30am this morning, the sidewalk project got underway. For many moons, I wondered whether this was going to come together. With the impending Chicago Winter and more free time of my own, the project jumped to a start once we had a new contractor for our curious project.

Deconstructing Sidewalk

The job basically entails swapping materials from one place to another. As much as possible, materials will be reused to create a better sidewalk where there was grass, and better growing space where there was a troublesome sidewalk.

The pre-cut with a dry saw and final cut with a wet-saw

My concrete guy, who we will call Chris, said to me "Oh, this is not a concrete job, this is a landscaping job." We'll see about that. Every project comes with some surprise, good or bad. So far, we've discovered a pre-existing sidewalk used as the underlayment below the existing sidewalk. Whatever kind of job they want to call it, I'm just glad to be paying someone else to do all of the cutting, lifting, and hauling.

Placing the new sidewalk pieces (stepping-stones)

The job:
Saw-cut the existing concrete sidewalk at the expansion joints and half-way in between.

Use 3'x5' slabs (now made of two half pieces) as Dr. Seuss-ish oversized stepping-stones.

Stepping-stones will outline the newly expanded growing area, allowing the growing area to extend all the way to the wall of the house.

Growing Area will include a native plant rain garden and food-production garden.

End of Day 1

Here are two bonus images, showing the dust cloud created by the saw-cutting. Dust cloud = Bad, Cool pictures = Good!

Facing East in the morning

Facing West in the afternoon

See you again tomorrow!

White Pine, Laid to Rest

2010-05-10T20:19:00.000-07:00

First, a little bit of historical information to bring us to the significance of the present moment.

On January 4, 1872, J. Sterling Morton proposed a tree-planting holiday to be called "Arbor Day" to the State Board of Agriculture in his home state of Nebraska. The first Arbor Day took place in Nebraska on April 10, 1872. Arbor Day became an official state holiday on March 12, 1874, as proclaimed by the state's Governor Robert W. Furnas, the first legally established celebration in Nebraska took place in April 1885, and then spread to other states in the 1870s, and took place in schools nationwide beginning in 1882.

The White Pine tree in my yard was probably aged about 37 years, as best I can count the rings. At that age, it would have been planted around 1973. Perhaps even on the 100th anniversary of Arbor Day, which was in April of 1972.

By the way, J. Sterling Morton had a son, Joy Morton, who was aged 17 years at the founding of Arbor Day. Following his own successful founding of the Morton Salt Company, Joy established the Morton Arboretum in Lisle, Illinois in 1921 to carry on the family motto of "Plant Trees".

Here are two pics from before the first cut and right after the crew left the site.

8:00am

10:30am

The White Pine has come down, laid to rest at 9:55am this morning. All of the tree will be kept on-site. The wood chips will be used to nourish and protect the perennial and vegetable planting beds, and the logs from the tree's trunk will be allowed to decay on-site, in the meantime being used in the design detailing.

Woodpecker Indicator

2010-04-13T20:46:00.000-07:00

When I say "Yellow-bellied Sapsucker" you are probably drawn to say "sufferin' succotash, that sounds like a fictitious animal if I ever heard one". Well, in this case, it may actually be a suffering White Pine. The Yellow-bellied Sapsucker (Sphyrapicus varius) is a woodpecker known for feeding on the sap of trees and on insects that get caught in the sap. Other birds exploit the holes made by sapsuckers and thus, the Yellow-bellied Sapsucker is considered a "keystone" species, one whose existence is integral to the health and stability of a community.

Recently, I noticed a woodpecker tapping into my White Pine tree. Much to my delight, it was a Yellow-bellied Sapsucker, the bird I studied for a year as my senior research project in my undergraduate program. While studying the feeding pattern of this bird species, I observed and counted thousands of holes, and saw the bird only once. During that year with my research team, we discovered that, among pine trees, sapsuckers have a significant preference for black pines and will "NEVER" eat from a White Pine so long as they have other options. And they almost always do; they feed from a variety of both gymnosperms and angiosperms. The characteristic pattern of holes made by sapsuckers can be seen in some White Pines, however, and that day I discovered them on my neighbor's side of the White Pine.

Upon my excitement at seeing 'an old friend', I immediately emailed my former professor at Valparaiso University's Biology Department, Dr. Laurie Eberhardt. She reminded me of her own research conclusions on sapsucker feeding. Sapsuckers tend to feed from trees that have overall poorer health. When a Yellow-bellied Sapsucker feeds from a White Pine, it is an indication that the tree is producing an elevated amount of amino acids - which is effectively the trees immune response to sickness. The feeding by a Yellow-bellied Sapsucker in my White Pine indicates the tree is probably sick. Removing the tree will remove a food source for this interesting migratory bird species but the tree will likely need to come down anyway as its condition worsens and potentially becomes a safety hazard.

[Image courtesy of the Cornell Lab of Ornithology: All About Birds. My own images are too fuzzy.]

Concept Development - Perspective Sketch

2010-03-18T14:32:00.000-07:00

Here are three images to give you an idea of how the layout developed.

My perspective sketch will help visualize the final design. I made it by drawing over a perspective view in SketchUp with pencil, then inking it and finally, coloring by hand with watercolor marker.

Before I created the SketchUp model, I drew a quick sketch of the interaction between the new path and the south-facing wall. While it is not to scale, it demonstrates the relationships between the new path, the espalier trees, and the rain barrels.

These pencil colored images were drawn to visualize possible layouts for the new sidewalk. I considered cutting the White Pine into discs to lay down as stepping blocks. Taking into consideration water collection areas, and the fact that the rear entrance probably needs a more substantial pathway than one made of wood, I made the decision to reuse the existing concrete as the material for the new path.

Shadow Analysis in SketchUp

2010-02-11T16:05:00.000-08:00

Performing a Sun/Shadow Analysis can be incredibly helpful during the design process. It's helpful to architects who want to assess solar input to a building for passive or active solar collection. For landscape architects, it has always been ingrained in the materials of our field.

The sun gives life to our plants, the building blocks of our trade, along with the soil and water they bed in. The sun-shadow cycle is to plants as the blankets-on/blankets-off cycle is to people, it determines their waking hours and resting hours.

Sunlight has other effects on plants as well; it's what dries the morning dew. By removing moisture, the sunlight can prevent certain plant diseases, while an increase in shade or quantity of water will make plants more susceptible to plants diseases and fungal infections that thrive in moist environments.

My sun-shadow study had surprising results for me. I learned that the White Pine on the south-west corner of our lot casts more shade than I suspected on our largest garden bed. By using the date and time functions in SketchUp, I was able to see at what time of day our garden bed is in the shadow of the White Pine. This set of images shows the shadows in our yard from the very beginning of our growing season to the end.

If the sunniest hours of the day are from 12-noon to 4pm, this garden bed is progressively covered by the White Pine during these hours. Removing it could increase access to sunlight by several hours each day. I have been hesitant to remove the White Pine for reasons of cost and privacy however, this analysis has proved to be a strong argument for 'repurposing' our pine wood!

The Undead of Winter: Tree Pruning

2010-02-01T12:46:00.000-08:00

Chicago Winters are the time of dormancy for plants. For gardeners and landscapers, it is a time to rest and plan. But if you have fruit trees, the dead of Winter is the ideal time to prune.

You will want to wait to prune until after the trees are fully dormant, which can be as early as late January or as late as March. Definitely, prune before the buds begin to swell in the Spring.

Winter pruning is ideal because it reduces the risk of infection. Come Spring, when plant pests and diseases are active, your Winter cuts will be sufficiently healed.

Water Sprouts:
Our trees don't have a problem with Suckers or Whorls, but they make up for it with Water Sprouts. All three of these are undesirable types of growth that will not improve fruit production. Why have fruit trees if you don't intend to harvest some nice fruit, eh? In the above image, I am removing one of many of these thin upright branches growing near the central trunk of the tree.

Air Circulation:
This image sequence shows you Before, During, and After shots when pruning the Water Sprouts from our Apple Tree. Compare them to see how much we were able to open up the core area of the tree. For trees to be able to produce healthy fruit, they need good air circulation.

I was told by a friend to approach tree pruning with the goal to allow birds to fly through the core and canopy. With that, it's important when pruning in the Winter to keep in mind how the tree will look in Spring after the leaves emerge and take up more space.

Harvest, and Safety:
We learned last Summer that, if we were going to make it easier on ourselves to care for fruit trees, it was time to take a No-Holds-Barred approach to pruning. As I said before, since we're growing these trees for their fruit, then I intend to harvest the entire tree (with a small donation to the wildlife in my yard). As you can see in the above sequence, we sawed off a large branch that was (1.) completely out of reach for harvesting and (2). careening rather dangerously over the public alley.

Fruit Tree Pests:
Another major change to our fruit tree care this year will be education and action against the pests that make our harvest and fruit consumption cumbersome. In the past, I've done my best to keep even one day ahead of the insects that have such an amorous affection for our trees. Here's what I learned so far:

I suspect we have one or both of two common larvae tunneling through our fruit.

Apple Maggots:
What you see: worms
Tree: Apples and Cherries
What to do: hang a Sticky Trap (a red ball or yellow triangle) in Late June through harvest. 2 traps per tree. Remove any fallen fruit immediately.

Codling Moth:
What you see: tunnels
Tree: Apples
What to do: spray Dormant Oil on leaves prior to leaf budding in late Winter or early Spring.

I'm also learning how to use Horticulture Oil, and nylon footies (yes, the kind you use at the shoe store) to protect fruit.

Good Sources for More Information:
Chicago Botanic Garden: monthly gardening checklist
North Carolina Cooperative Extension Service: not our climate but they have Excellent illustrations of fruit tree training and pruning techniques.

Advice from an Engineer, Landscape Architect

2009-12-16T11:58:00.000-08:00

I had the opportunity to speak with an Engineer about the Rain Barrels and the problem with one not draining. The great thing about speaking to another person when working on a project is that they help you see the things that are already right in front of you. The great thing about talking with an experienced professional Engineer is that they know stuff I don’t know. Like how a few inches can make a big difference.

The Engineer explained to me that the height of the Rain Barrel above the ground, which is where the water outlet is – the soaker hose, can make all the difference in the water’s drainage rate. Soaker hoses require pressure to operate well and at the height at which my rain barrel sat, that water wasn’t going to go anywhere.

Those of you who read my second entry (Set up a Rain Barrel in three easy steps, Oct 8, 2009) will recall that I began with the Rain Barrel sitting on three stone pavers at approximately nine inches above the ground. When I finished the project, I left the barrel sitting on one paver, about three inches above the ground – an obvious difference that I consciously changed not knowing it would have such an effect (see the fourth entry, Waterclogged, Oct 9, 2009). Knowing that Soaker Hoses can be temperamental, and that they require pressure to push the water through, I intend to build a tall riser made of wood for this barrel.

An alternative would be to allow all the rain from this (north) side of the roof to travel through the downspout, across a constructed runnel, to the Rain Garden in the front yard, and completely eliminate the use of a Rain Barrel.

I spoke with a Landscape Architect friend who has his own hands on experience turning his traditional home landscape into a complete, sustainable water system utilizing Rain Barrels, Rain Gardens, Runnels, Bioswales, a Green Roof, Pervious Pavers, and a miniature urban Prairie. (Yes, I intend to emulate him). He suggested a runnel for my drainage system on this side of the house, which would allow me to eliminate the Rain Barrel and make the Runnel and Rain Garden my sole system there.

This would only be influenced by the ability of the front yard to hold a Rain Garden. It’s a small space with two trees that could be damaged by standing water. Watch for a development in the Rain Garden design as I tackle this decision.

Plans, and the planning planner who plans them.

2009-11-02T19:14:00.000-08:00

I apologize for the delay (to myself and the curious few who were awaiting them). I am a planner, not a professional Planner, but one who plans, and plans and plans, enjoying the creative investigation, ongoing inquiry, and organizing that is part of making a 'plan'.

With delight, I now present my Site Analysis and Proposal ("Plan") for my current residential project.

Site Analysis

Proposal

I have been fortunate to be able to access this space at will, because I live here. As a result, whenever I had a question about the landscape, I defaulted to making a trip outside to investigate and gather primary research. This may have delayed the design process but is also quite an opportunity and one of only a few cases when one can do this. What I mean is, while I am woo'ing my neighbors, I'll proceed with the construction of my landscape design, which is, of course, part of the woo'ing process.

A few points of note:
1. The evergreen tree. This is a very healthy White Pine that none would want to cut down except an urban gardener or one who wants more sun on the south side of her home. I happen to be both of these. On the downside, if we cut down the tree, we might have to pay money to have this done, and we might find the tree provided a nice service, such as a wind break for the back yard. All in all, the tree may stay.

I'm trying to avoid paying for this service (Hey, anyone want some really nice and straight white pine wood that's great for woodworking!?) and if we should find there is a wind issue, I'll be prepared to plant something else in it's place. You may have noticed, I have not provided a planting plan. A task for another day; a plan for another blog.

2. The Plum tree problem. I recently visited our metropolitan area's fair botanic garden and learned that plum trees need to be planted in pairs in order to procreate successfully. I'm guessing our plum formerly had a mate in a nearby yard, when it was producing fruit successfully, and is now a desperate young widow throwing pollen to the wind in hopeless efforts for offspring. I have provided two options for planting a 'pair' tree for this plum: another dwarf plum tree in the yard or, a wall-trained plum tree against the south side of the house. I just need to insure that the two trees are compatible species and that they will flower at the same time.

3. The vegetable garden beds. This is not my original design. I sketched one on paper while standing in the yard, then designed another in AutoCAD where I had measurements to follow. The temporary cold frame (see previous blog) in this location would fit almost exactly into the northwest box you see in the drawing (keep in mind, north is up in the drawing and because it isn't exact, I will likely redo either the cold frame or the drawing). As the days of this season progress, I'm learning about winter sun patterns from observing the sun and from a housemate who has lived here longer than I have. There may be a few small adjustments made to accommodate the best lighting for the permanent garden beds.

4. Trees in general. Some of the issues with the trees in the Site Analysis are being resolved by simply pruning them more regularly. This increases sun access on the site and improves the health of the tree. Additionally, I intend to research organic pest control solutions for next season's crops.

If I have left out anything, dear readers, please don't hesitate to contact me. Your inquiry is my opportunity.

Cold Frame, Hot Materials

2009-11-02T15:58:00.000-08:00

Hot not as in 'stolen', rather used here to mean 'found', and free, and useful for framing, mass and insulation. Now that's totally cool. A cold frame is a structure that surrounds a garden bed, allows light to penetrate, has an insulating mass on the interior, and thus allows gardeners to extend their growing season.

I set out this past weekend to locate discarded items useful for making a cold frame to cover one of my vegetable garden beds. I have never before made a cold frame and while I have a complete landscape plan for the lot (see upcoming post), I wanted to get something built NOW.

Today, I made a very simple cold frame that can be constructed in a very short period of time (depending on how well-developed your project is when you begin).

I began with a garden bed that has already been in use, and even had small plants that I grew from seeds several weeks ago. My ‘found’ materials include:

2 windows (approx. 3’ x 4’)
2 wooden boards (2” x 10” x 8')
several bricks

Cold Frame Framing

In this picture you can see where I put the boards, which will contain the soil, and the bricks, which will absorb heat from the sun and slowly release it through the day. Currently, the boards are being held up by other bricks but will soon be held together by nails with shorter wooden boards on the ends.

The board on the south side (right) is nestled into a trench about 2 inches wide and 2 or 3 inches deep, spanning the length of the board. This places the board lower than the other and allows the windows to angle just a bit southward, towards the sun. (For my ideal cold frame, the framing will be designed to place the windows at an angle appropriate to Chicago’s winter solar position).

Cold Frame Finished

It took me about two hours to build this cold frame. While it was designed to be a temporary structure, it’s one that I know has worked for others. When I’m enjoying fresh spinach in January, I’ll let you know.

Second rain barrel, a fraction of the labor. And a surprise.

2009-10-15T12:54:00.000-07:00

I set out last night, rather late in the day, to put together the second rain barrel. This one is in a different location and will have different duties, but I have lessons and advice from the first one and felt pretty good about my ability to do it more efficiently this time. The most significant difference to this set-up sequence was the upgrade from Anna-powered hack saw to the electricity-powered reciprocating saw, also known as a Sawzall.

Now, I've always been a tomboy and a do-it-myself-er (dissecting any animal, vegetable, mineral, or piece of technology I could get my hands on as a child), so if you've never used a power saw I suggest you get some help with this project. Be sure to use a blade for metal and not for wood.

See reciprocating saw here:

I had that downspout cut in no time! I neglected to mention with the first rain barrel that cutting the downspout with a hack saw took most of the labor time. In fact, it took most of my morning. Using the reciprocating saw took the cutting time down from hours to seconds. (Perhaps my next task should be to become a super hero, or to figure out how to power a reciprocating saw using a bicycle.)

With the new downspout came a new lesson: Be sure to check what is holding up your downspout before you cut it.
Both of my downspouts are connected to the house in three places: at the top, connected to the gutter and in two places it is held near the wall with a metal arm that reaches around it. The downspout is made up of a few pieces, some straight, some that curve to bring the downspout under the eave and close to the house.

With the first rain barrel on the north side, I got lucky. All the pieces of the downspout were securely held together so that when I cut the downspout and removed the bottom connection, the downspout still held together. When I cut the downspout on the south side of the house, the downspout swung away from the wall, pivoting at the top holding arm, and separated at the elbow from the top piece of downspout. I apologize for not having any pictures of this but I was a bit preoccupied at the time trying to keep a lot of metal from falling on top of me.

I'm typically 'afraid' of heights, but here's what I did:
I got up on this 'very tall ladder' (as Christopher Robin might say) and put it back together by hand. I secured it additionally with some tape, which seems to be working just fine.

Funny I should mention a robin. With the vigorous cutting of the reciprocating saw, the robin's nest that has been atop my downspout for as long as I've lived here was caused to fall to the ground. I scored a few broken and empty blue robin eggs and a very cool nest. Looking at it, I'm saddened to think how much effort went into making it and how much work it will be for the robin to make a new one. The nest is top heavy from the mud that lines the interior.

In the image below, you can see the shape of the nest made to fit this particular site. The circular hole is the bottom where the nest rested on top of the elbow of the downspout, the flat side was against the wall of the house. What you cannot see in this image are the sides that had hugged the curve of the downspout. A very impressive architectural piece.

Water-clogged, Day 2

2009-10-10T20:09:00.000-07:00

I left the full rain barrel alone for a day to drain through the hose but alas, it has not. I debated whether to open the bottom valve to drain it, which would probably leave a large puddle of water around the barrel and could possibly even flood the basement. If I didn't empty it, it would definitely overflow in an overnight rain.

I decided to risk the flood and emptied the barrel by opening the bottom valve. Since I have yet to set up the secondary system it created the big puddle I predicted. Fortunately, we have surprisingly decent soil and it soaked in quickly. There was no flooding in the basement that night but it was inspiration to make a decision about the what the secondary system would be, buried drain tile or...?

Water-clogged

2009-10-09T19:49:00.000-07:00

It has been raining all day today. I have been away from the house working on two other job sites on the north side, so I approached the rain barrel this evening with some anticipation. Would it be empty, would it be overflowing? Before I left this morning I opened the spigot attached to the soaker hose so that the barrel could slowly drain but I didn't have a plan for overflow. I wanted to test drainage through the soaker hose.

I put my hand on the top of the lid and gave it a nudge. It was heavy. Absolutely full. What had happened? I have checked all the other nozzles and the other end of the hose. I'm not sure what happened but my first job will be to check if there is silt clogging the system somewhere. The other thought is that the hose might just drain slower than I expected.

My Chicago-issue rain barrel came with a cap on each spigot and I had left them on to test the system. From now on, I will leave the top overflow spigot open. I did have the forethought to place that spigot over the drain tile entrance so any overflow would enter the secondary system.

First Rain

2009-10-08T15:30:00.000-07:00

As it turns out, I chose a good day to set up my rain barrel. Shortly after completing construction, we had a gentle rain for less than an hour. I had closed all the spigots in the rain barrel so that I could measure how much rain we got. What a surprise!

Here you see the rain barrel is just over half full (half empty?). The picture is a little fuzzy but it best shows the level of water in the barrel and the rate at which it was filling.

It's important to note that this rain barrel is fed by less than half of my roof. In a separate blog I will show calculations but for now I can say, one barrel will not be enough to store all the rain water from an average Chicago rain.

Fortunately, I do not intend to store the water from this side of the house. The goal for this rain barrel is to control the water that comes onto the site and the rain barrel allows me to decide where it goes and when. By leaving the soaker hose attached and the spigot open, I can disperse the water over a greater area and send it towards the native plant garden at the front of my house. This way, the barrel is continuously emptying and, my hope is that it will never become full or overflow.

You are probably now wondering what I intend to do with the excess water in a typical or heavy rain. The rain barrel has been an easy solution for now. As I develop the plans for the entire site, I am exploring options. The most likely option presently is to bury the existing drain tile along its current course. This will take excess water flowing out of the top rain barrel spigot and put it immediately underground (a general water management goal). The water in the drain tile will behave much like the soaker hose but will put the water at the roots of plants or just below, encouraging them to grow deep. Of course, this all depends on how much digging I can handle to get the drain tile below ground - a labor-intensive option.

Set up a rain barrel in three easy steps.

2009-10-08T13:30:00.000-07:00

I set up my first rain barrel today! After some days of hesitation about making a permanent cut in a metal downspout, I put on my work gear (rain coat and rain boots today), grabbed the tools on my list, and set out to get the job done. I'll admit I had been hesitant for a while. It seemed like 'a big deal' to set up a rain barrel. I had never done it before and being a bit of a perfectionist, I wanted to do it right. Well, here's what I did.

Above you see the existing conditions of the first rain barrel site. This is the north side of my house. The downspout normally leads into a drain tile that disperses the water. Here I set up about three inches of stone paver to put the rain barrel on (I ultimately used one paver, not two), adjacent to the existing downspout so that it can be reconnected during the winter months. The downspout will be cut to a shorter length making it the right height to lead water through a plastic elbow into the rain barrel.
Here's my gear:
Plastic elbow to reroute the water (with glove for scale):

Hack saw:

Soaker hose:

Step 1.
Set up all the equipment and draw a line where the downspout will be cut.

I set up all the equipment where it should be to measure where to cut the downspout. It's not in this picture but I did curve the plastic elbow and hold it up above the rain barrel to draw a pencil line where I should cut the downspout.

Step 2.
Cut the downspout with the hack saw.

As you can see in this picture, I had to switch to a different hack saw to complete the cut. Being unfamiliar with saw lingo, I can only say that the first saw was too narrow to cut through the entire width of the downspout.

Step 3.
Hook up the equipment!

Make sure your rain barrel base (I used one stone paver) is sturdy and mostly level. Put the rain barrel on top and center it. My pavers are a bit small for the base of my barrel so I have the back side a little over the edge but against the wall of the house. Fit the plastic elbow over the bottom of the downspout and curve it to lead to the top and center of the rain barrel. I have also attached a soaker hose to disperse the water and to lead it towards my garden.

Waterblogged

2009-10-08T10:47:00.000-07:00

'Waterblogged' seems to be an appropriate title for the first project at hand: rerouting water at my home for the express purpose of preventing all that pesky flooding. I live in a traditional Chicago bungalow single-family style home. The house has some land around it on all sides though one side has a very thin strip of land, typical of urban living. This area seems to be the source of the water that floods the basement.

In dealing with this task, I've decided to do a complete overhaul of water handling on my lot. My hope is that by blogging about it I can share the trials, errors, lessons learned and design ideas that I encounter through this process.

I am a biologist and landscape architect by training and hope to continue this blog to include my other interests, urban food production and restored urban ecology.