into the gutters, then through the downspouts into our rain barrels. it wasn't until 4:30pm when it'd rained enough that we finally started getting some accumulation. the sound of rain trickling into the barrels is a soothing music. i knew our existing rain barrels were working, but i was curious about the 3 new barrels out in front of the house. the catch barrel was filling up, the one next to it was slowly getting a trickle of water, while the third barrel on the end wasn't getting anything. later when the rain stopped i went outside to check the front barrels again: the third barrel was still empty, the middle barrel had some water but it was below the brass bulkhead fitting, and the catch barrel had the most rain.
the rain gauge in the backyard only increased by about an inch at most. that meant all 11 rain barrels had to increase by that much (only 10 since one of the barrels was still empty). if we were somehow able to collect all the rain from the roof into a single barrel, it would still only raise the water meter level less than a foot (10 inches). it doesn't mean we got an inch of rainfall though; the official count in boston was just 0.02" worth of rain.
we need more rain! rain barrels are worthless without rain. just our luck we decided to expand our rain barrel collection by 4 more barrels (200 gallons) during a time when massachusetts is experiencing a summer drought. lawns are all yellow, the garden plants look dehydrated, my garlics seem stunted. what i wouldn't give for a long soaking rain! but it's been so dry that if we were to receive a sudden burst of torrential rain, a lot of that would simply flow into the storm drains as the ground is too dry to absorb so much water. we need a long slow soaking instead of a deluge.
