Garden Notes: Rain Barrel Stewards

Guided by a garden stewardship plan, Boxerwood is always looking for ways to slow the flow of our stormwater. “As any visitor to Boxerwood realizes, we’re built on a hill,” explained Operations Director Hannah West, “and big rain events degrade our creekbeds, sending sediment into Woods Creek and beyond.” Over the years Boxerwood has implemented various practices to help slow the flow, including installing multiple rain gardens and berm and swale systems. This fall we boosted efforts again by adding two heavy-duty rain barrels able to capture and divert 28,000 gallons of rain water rolling off our barn roof every year. “This big new collection system not only helps us with managing stormwater, it’s also a wonderful new source for caring for our garden plants,” said Hannah. 

The project started innocently enough. Last April, Boxerwood’s gardener Jenna Hill noticed how much water came off the roof of our barn, and she considered redirecting some of it to water a few plants she was propagating nearby. “There were some valuable plants we had to clear that I didn’t want to just toss, so I started potting them up,” she explained. “It became sort of a plant orphanage.” A plan for a modest collection system quickly grew when Jenna wrote and secured a $5,000 watershed protection grant from the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality last spring. The investment was sufficient to repair existing water damage in the barn, procure two, large tanks and related materials, and cover a good portion of project labor. 

Now up and running, the barn’s rainwater collection system has transformed a chronic water management problem into a conservation solution. The simple capture technology protects the surrounding area from erosion and also prevents vegetative stress. In addition, Jenna explained, “We can reduce our dependency on city water and protect the barn, since all that rainwater had previously gone straight into the ground around the foundation." Importantly, the captured water also creates plentiful reserves for drought, and can hydrate planted areas of Boxerwood that previously were too far from water. 

Reflecting on how it all came together, Jenna noted the valuable contributions of Shanti Leasure, Boxerwood’s part-time contractor. Over the summer, the two worked together to install the gutters, align the system’s elements, and set the two 300-gallon barrels on their foundations.  Now that the collection system is up and working, Jenna looks forward to nurturing the Garden with its support. “We’ve lost some saplings out in the field because it’s been so hard to get water out to them,” she explained. “I’m really excited that we’ll be able to tap the barrels and fill our tanks for these young trees.” Reflecting on the project overall, she said, “I love that it started out as this little thing, and then it turned into something much bigger and more far-reaching.”