It was a stormy Memorial Day eve and we got a nice rain. Memorial Day dawned bright and beautiful and we made our annual trek to the cemeteries to pay our respects. The rain, somewhat over half an inch, was the first for May, except for an inconsequential wetting early in the month, and it was welcome. Our rain barrel was down to about a third full but this rain topped off. It was full from April rain when I attached the dripper to it about a week ago. That set up is self-regulating because as the water level in the barrel drops there is less and less pressure and consequently the drip slows down. The dripper is maybe 10 inches high and would stop dripping altogether once the water level in the barrel reached the same level. Whereas it took a week to run two thirds of the water in the barrel through the dipper, it would take longer than that to lower the level to reach parity with the dripper because of the aforementioned slow down. No doubt we will eventually learn how long it takes to reach the no-drip point, but for now the system is all charged up and the cycle begun again. Continue reading “Memorial Day”