The average roof sheds 160 gallons of rainwater per hour during a moderate rain fall. Rainwater is better for your garden than tap water: it is at ambient temperature rather than being cold, and it is not chlorinated or treated with chemicals.

The Garden Water Saver, is a device that attaches to your home’s downspout, and allows you to use any container as a rainwater barrel. It diverts rainwater until the container becomes full, and then it automatically shuts off. It will fill a 55 gallon rain barrel in 2 to 3 hours during a moderate rainfall. The kit is available for $19.95 from Garden Water Saver.

Unfortunately, most rainwater tanks and cisterns are unsightly blocks of concrete or plastic. The LUMI Rainwater Tank, however, was designed by Katrina Logan to be visually appealing. It’s made of sculptural satin acrylic and can be made in a range of colors and sizes (250 liters - 1100 liters). The tank glows in the sunlight, making the rainwater reserves visible, and has internal lights that illuminate the tank in the evening.

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We recommend rain water as one of the purest waters for baths and pools. Even in cities, rain can be purified easily. Most pollution falls in the first three minutes and the rest of the water can simply be filtered to a level where it will rival the purity of spring water or bottled water.

See more information about heating water efficiently and here’s how to catch the rain.

Arid Solutions makes these unique and practical rain barrels. Their octagonal shape increases the durability of the barrel.

Each barrel has two overflow outlets, allowing you to connect multiple tanks together. The system show here is actually two 54 gallon barrels: one is stacked on top of the other for a total of 108 gallons.

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Aaron makes rain barrels out of recycled plastic, and runs an informative web site about rain water harvesting.

The 58 gallon rain barrels are made out of thick food-grade plastic, and can withstand both hot and cold temperatures. The barrels connect directly to the downspout of your rain gutter.

They are also paintable (with Krylon Fusion) for those who want to match the harvesting tank to the color of their homes.

They are available for $125 which includes shipping.

Visit these site for more information:
http://www.ne-design.net and
http://www.rain-barrel.net

HarvestH20

This site has very comprehensive set of Rain Water Harvesting Links

"Harvest the Rain"

Article on rain water harvesting with lots of information.

Rainbarrel
Tutorial

From the
Maryland Environmental Design Program.

Another Rainbarrel
Tutorial

How to
build a simple rainbarrel.

The Garden Water Saver

Different Types of Rain Barrels and Water Systems for the Garden.

Composters.Com

Many kind of rain barrels for sale.

Rain Water Solutions

Sells
rain barrels built from recycled plastic.

It is possible to produce pure drinking water from rain water
using a combination of devices costing around $300 total.

Here’s how to do it:

1. Install a roof
   washer and a rain
   barrel ($200). A roof washes diverts the first ten gallons or
   so of rain water away from your barrel — it contains such things
   as dust and bird dropping from the roof.
2. Put the water caught in the barrel
   into a counter-top ceramic
   gravity drip filter ($220) or this portable,
   inexpensive model ($100). The water will be filtered
   free of cysts, bacteria, metals, pollutants and pollen. (The Red
   Cross use this type of filter in the field to purify questionable
   water for drinking.)
3. Come back an hour later and drink the pure, highly-filtered, rain
   water from the filter’s faucet.

The water than comes out of
this system will be purer than commercial bottled water, faucet filtered
or tap water. It will retain the taste of rain water because the drip
filter does not flatten the taste of the water. You can produce up
to four gallons a day.

This is a basic outline of the process. Doulton has
the detailed information on Drip
Filters. Their site is full of information, although it takes some
digging to find. You might want to start with their FAQ.

For extra protection, you can use an ozonator to
kill viruses in water smaller than .02 microns. Ozonators use less
energy than UV Light, Reverse Osmosis or Distillation.