Last year I set up two rain barrels in my yard. One in the front yard and one in the back yard. But I made some mistakes, and I wanted to write a post about some of the things I learned so that others don't repeat my mistakes.

Earn that rebate

First of all, it's possible to get paid to set up a rain barrel. If you build it yourself and use affordable or secondhand supplies, then you can actually make money on your rain barrel. Rebates vary by county, and Santa Clara County will only pay you $35 per rain barrel, but I can imagine setting up five barrels using cheap equipment from Craigslist and making a tidy $175 for improving my home!

Basic plumbing isn't that difficult

Second, you should spend some time learning the basics of DIY plumbing before starting your project. Building a first flush filter and an overflow system is extremely easy if you bother to take the 30 minutes it takes to understand them. Not only that, but Santa Clara County will only offer you a rebate if you build the basic overflow system that they require.

Mosquitos are pretty lame

Finally, make sure to plan for a fully enclosed rain barrel. You can have a hole in the top to allow water to enter, but it must be sealed or covered with a screen to prevent mosquitos from reproducing in it. Again, this is a requirement of the county I live in, and it's probably a requirement of your county, too.

Learn from my mistakes

So what mistakes did I make when I built my rain barrels?

Well, I opted for aesthetics rather than going for the rebates. I built a system that looks good in my yard, as opposed to one that is robust and that qualifies for the rebates.

I wanted beautiful half wine barrels rather than ugly plastic barrels. Here I am posing with my system during a light fall rain.

And I do think the system looks about as good as a rain barrel can. I like the aesthetic of a half filled wine barrel.

But boy do I need to use that water quickly! If I leave it in there for more than two weeks, then I will start seeing mosquito larvae in there, and that's really not good.

Also, there's no first flush filter or overflow mechanism, and since a half barrel is woefully inadequate for catching even a fraction of the rain from a decent rainstorm, these barrels are constantly overflowing.

I did install an adjustable diverter that allows me to only capture a small portion of the rain coming off my roof, but that's not nearly sufficient to a big storm.

So I am in the process of reworking my rain barrels. I am adding a first flush filter and a proper overflow system that goes back into the downspouts.

But I hope that you learn from my mistakes, and include those basic systems from the start!