Rain Water Harvesting

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kdp0511

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For those of you that have no mains water and have to collect rain water for you horses.

How do you do it successfully?

We inherited a system collecting water off the stable roof into white containers. The water is brown and has bugs in it. We thoroughly scrubbed them clean when we got there (very difficult), but still it sometimes smells. The horse drink it, but I worry.

Is there a way to ensure the water stays clean.

Thanks for your replys

Kim
 
Ours were always just in big blue barrels that caught run off from the rooves. I wouldn't drink it ;) but then horses aren't human and I'm pretty sure they drink worse out in the fields!
 
We have two huge metal tanks with taps on in which we collect our water via the gutters on the stables and barn. We cover the tanks so that the sun and leaves etc don't get in and I can honestly say we don't get any bugs in it and the water is as clear as rain water but not as clear as tap water. All of our horses don't mind drinking it and it lasts for months when the tanks are full. We also have one of the polycarbonate tanks - all the tanks were full before the bad weather last winter which was a godsend and we only had to take water down in the dry spell earlier in the year. They save us so much time and effort carting water down to the field.
 
We collect rainwater off the buildings into large white plastic containers. We use this for cleaning buckts,hooves and so on. But for drinking water we bought a second hand bowser and fill it from the tap at home, them tow it to the yard. We do this about once a month or less.
 
Could it be that the roofs are contaminating the water, you should scrub collection barrels with bleach every so often, but it should not look dirty imho, also it is better to have dark rather than light colour butts
 
Yes I do this but I clean the guttering out if its got leaves in thats what pollutes it. Mine collects into a big black container which is raised and has a lid to keep it dark as the light will help algae grow and it will go green. But leaves off the trees really can cause a stink in the warm weather. Usually in the summer I do take lots of 25 litre cannisters down prefilled with fresh water and would really like to invest in a bowser if I had a lot of horses so I could take fresh water.

My big black container came from Atlantic supplies it was about £70 and about 330gallons I have seen them on ebay and mine had stored concentrated orange juice. I do jet hose it out sometimes..I put it on a trailer & bring it home once a year.

But keep a lid on to stop mozzies and bugs etc. Mine is raised high and I have a hose attachment on it.
 
We have the large 6ft tall black ex juice containers to collect water off the stable roof. They do a great job as they don't let the light in so the water comes out as clear as you'd expect rainwater to. Also they have a screw on lid so no chance off anything getting in the top. I'm lucky that we haven't any trees near to the stable roof so no problems with leaves in the guttering, but you could always put some mesh over the downpipe into the butt to filter stuff like that out.
I did a test with my horses initially and gave them a bucket of tap water and a bucket of rainwater in their stable and they would chose to drink the rainwater every time so I've given them rainwater ever since and had no health issues.
Oh and it means you get excited when it rains as your tanks get filled up!
 
I find that half a pair of 'knee high' tights over the end of the downpipe catches most of the crap and when it gets manky I just turn it inside out, dunk it in a bucket of water and then put it back on.
 
we have a big bait barrel which collects rain water from the shed roof. they have all survived so far...! :p

in the summer we need to bring water up in butts from the house as we have no water sourse and the burns dry up too... havent had to take much up this summer so far though...!
 
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