Shed Roof Provides Rainwater For Farm Greenhouse

Shed Roof Provides Rainwater For Farm Greenhouse BUILDINGS Accessories Well water at the Tourne Sol Cooperative farm in Quebec is too saline to grow healthy seedlings so Renee Primeau one of the farm owners devised a collection system to capture rainwater from a Quonset building roof “First she ran 80 ft of eavestrough along the base of the Quonset to collect all the runoff ” says her husband Reid Allaway “The water isn’t necessarily clean depending on how often it rains so a ‘first-flush’ diverter drains off a small amount of dust and dirt-filled water initially then the remainder is collected ” The rainwater moves from the trough through a pantyhose filter into a small sump at the end of the building From there it’s lifted with an electric submersible pump to a 3 000-gal holding tank “The whole system was easy to build and we’ve probably got $3 000 invested in the troughs sump pump and the large opaque tank The tank feeds a boost pump inside the greenhouse for watering plants ” Allaway built a clever hose trolley inside the greenhouse so workers can easily water plants without dragging a hose across the floor He suspended a unistrut from the center of the ceiling then made several trolleys that cradle a 100-ft garden hose in gentle loops “The hose deploys and retracts without a hitch or wrinkle so the water pressure is always constant All we do is oil the trolley once a year and it’s been trouble-free which makes watering anywhere in the 80-ft greenhouse a snap ” Contact: FARM SHOW Followup Tourne-Sol Co-operative Farm 1025 Chemin St-Dominique les Cedres Quebec Canada J7T 1P5 ph 450 452-4271; info@fermetournesol qc ca

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