Rainwater swale for fruit trees - Desert Permaculture 

+Joseph McCaffrey Thanks Joseph! Should have a video up soon on this years rainwater gardening project where I grow corn and squash with run off water from my dirt driveway:) It'll be up in a day or so... just finishing putting it together now:) Joe

Slowvannah Farms Thank you Sarah:)

Thanks Simon! Great advice and I think I'll have to incorporate some gravel to help aid in slowing the water down a bit:) thanks! joe

Well just trowing my 2 cents. ;-) A silt trap and a relatively shallow soaking pit, before the water box. Would probably be your best bet to charge the soil with water. The best place for it to be. Considering that most will evaporate soon in that type of region. Can be added relatively easy and will not interfere with the good work you already done. ;-) Cheers

Darbin Orvar Thanks Linn! I wish we had the abundance of water that you guys have up there:) Joe

Darbin Orvar Hey Linn, just a thought, but I was thinking about your french drain that you installed and was thinking maybe you could make a cool video project out of that area. Maybe some perennial plants in some cool 'darbin orvar' custom planters near the downspouts or a beautiful Ipe grate on your drain (if it is the style of French drain that has a grate within the rock). Or heck, maybe a mini water pond for Darwin to play in after a rain...lol... it'd be cute footage! Joe

Hi Love it 😉 It is fun digging trenches or swales isn't it 😉 especially watching them develop. I love it!!! My project is in southern Spain and nowhere near as development as this one, where is this project ? Thanks Roy 😉

Bjørnar Magnussen Thanks Bjornar! It's a work in progress, I gotta build up the berms a bit as they were just about at capacity... but so far it's been working great and in our area it's so crucial that I make use of every bit of rainfall that I get:) Thanks for the comment and for watching Bjornar! Joe

I don’t get the pun

+Randall Montgomery Thanks Randall... let me know how your project goes... I'd love to see what you come up with! A barn should provide tons a great water to use for your trees:) Joe

GFD472 Thanks GFD! I appreciate it... but I think you might be giving me more credit than I deserve:) But so far so good on this one. I do have plans to add more swales and rain harvesting systems.... but I've got to get some equipment first, as this one was hand dug and took a long time.... lol!

joseph mascarenhas thanks Joseph!

Yes, it's been an awesome project to build and really pretty darn simple! In the desert it's always cool to see how we can catch a little bit more of that rain water:) thanks for watching! joe

+polly blackburn Thanks PB!

+Orion Roger Thanks Orion!

Sam K Thanks for watching Sam!

me neither, i'm unsure of what he called them, "water weers"? Super Amazing :D

ok, its spelt "water weirs" Good Luck on your projects

thanks so much Claude:) Joe

RetroWeld Thanks Douglas! btw, just watched your side table video.... aawweeesssoommmee! Joe

Thanks Joe!

Allen Ash Thanks Allen... it's a work in progress but it helps me keep these fruit trees watered in our dry climate:) Joe

cokeman250 Thanks Cokeman! We gotta take full advantage of it when we get it! Now I'm gonna go watch a video about how to make authentic homemade country baked beans.. you wouldn't know a good recipe would you;) Joe

Blackberry Hideout thanks Jessica! btw... I'm gonna need some help with honey collection, prickly pear picking, and a host of other things in the next few days... you wouldn't happen to know anybody thats gonna be in the area would you;)

+homesteadonomics Why, yes, yes I do know someone who will be in the area that will be more than happy to do your bidding (provided you have more protective equipment for honey harvesting)!! Start making your to-do list, brother!

I've got big plans! Assuming jury duty doesn't foul things up that is:)

Ted Alexander haha.. absolutely! The desert makes you enjoy every rain and those rare gloomy/cloudy days!

Thanks Luiz! Glad you liked it and got some good ideas! Would love to hear what you come up with:) Joe

You would get"a kick" out of a poem my dad wrote for the bathroom: "If you are more than 3 feet tall, sit-down to pee! Don't splat the wall. If you MUST stand up to pee, go outside and find a TREE! (I have 5 brothers).

houtjeboom Thanks HB:)

thanks so much Greg!

radicaljoe Thanks Joe! I hope they would approve too:) Even if not, it's still working for my purposes:) Thanks for watching as always and great to hear from you Joe! Joe

HerringBone Thanks HB!

+Tim Woodger Thanks Tim! Joe

+East Texas Homestead Thanks ETH! I'll bet you could make one heck of a system like this in E TX!

no doubt! we've got big ideas and aspirations for our property. at the moment we just have one small swale in until we move out there and can do more.

High Desert Hollow Much appreciated HDH!

Danny Fox Thanks Danny... we try to collect every drop we can:)

Canadian Sasquatch Thanks CSB!

Dutchhorse Thanks DH! I appreciate the share and all the videos you put up as well:) Joe

Lacy C That sounds awesome Lacy! I'd love to see what you guys come up with if you want to share... always interested in what fellow desert dwellers are doing in there gardens! I'm in the mountains west of Sahuarita so we are a bit cooler than Tucson but overall pretty much the same gardening environment as a whole:) Joe

homesteadonomics Looks like a green desertification movement is being started. Great video. Any plans to extend garden past that hickory tree?

William Walter Doh mesquite tree.

Nic Ames Thanks Nic! You're absolutely right... if I can do something out here in the desert with just a few fruit trees... then people in areas with more consistent rain could do some really amazing stuff with much less dependence on well/city/etc water or other water sources:) I have some other areas that I'm working on similar rainwater diversion in too... in about 3 weeks or so I should be doing an update on my rainwater corn/squash project where i grow the corn/squash off of nothing but our monsoon rains! thanks for watching! Joe

+Patricia Ribaric Thanks Patricia! Glad you liked it.. hopefully I'll be able to improve upon it and have a great update video during this years monsoon season:) Joe

homesteadonomics It is a bit crazy this past year. In OH in June it was dark and cold, and in Dec. it was sunny and very warm. We had a fly outside our kitchen window on Christmas day with windows open over night. That is crazy for close to lake Erie.

Yep, thats a great idea... I think I saw it from a Geoff Lawton video I saw a while back. I am planning on just that for a future swale/pond project:) Joe

That is probably where I picked it up myself. :)

yack f zay Thanks YFZ!

+Adrienne Smith Thanks so much Adrienne! Very cool you are taking a PDC too! I want to take one some day but just haven't as of yet.... anyways, thanks for subbing as I'll definitely have some more permaculture-y stuff coming out during the summer monsoon season!!!! I'm wanting to put in some large scale swales as well as improve/upgrade my rainwater garden project too :D Joe

+DmnSpawn1 Thanks so much! it's really cool to see what you can create with just a shovel and a level! thanks for watching:) Joe

+Gelfling 3 Thanks so much Gelfling! It's so cool to see what you can do with some simple berms and runoff water... hoping to keep improving these systems around my property and I'm glad you might be getting some ideas for your own property too:) Joe

+euphony745 Thanks Euphony:)

+weRbananas Great tip and thanks for watching WRB's :) Joe

UpCycle Engineer Thanks UC Eng! Very much appreciated!

Thanks!

Bruce A. Ulrich yep, it's a precious resource for sure...especially for us desert dwellers! But I will say, it's been living in the desert that has changed my outlook on 'gloomy/rainy days'... I used to dread them in other parts of the country but here, everybody gets excited... like Christmas morning!!! Thanks for watching Bruce:) Joe

homesteadonomics Interesting the different perspectives. In Mississippi in the winter, I just cringe when it rains. It is so wet here in the winter, any little bit of rain just stands...the ground cannot soak any more in.

Bruce A. Ulrich hahaha... yes, indeed! If I could trade you half of your rain and half of my 'dry' then we'd both be in heaven! I remember at our place in Louisiana my Dad built our pond by just digging a hole and boom... pond! haha... I guess it wasn't quite that easy, but dang near that easy:) Just got to figure out what works with that extra moisture. I know some trees are such heavy drawers of water that they can help dry out a perennial muddy spot in a yard. Anyways, thanks for the comment Bruce! Joe

homesteadonomics Very true. We planted an American sycamore tree in a low spot in the back yard last year. I can't wait to see that thing get big. They're very pretty trees. We have also planted some river birch trees...they like the wet. Lots of sweet gum trees around too.

weetreebonsai hahaha... yes, those suckers... I was thinking about letting them grow a bit so that I can do some grafts on to them since they are from the root stock... but I think I got to get them rooted first:)

Henry Pu Yi Hey Henry, the monsoon is certainly here... I can't say it's more precip than in the past... but it's not over yet and it did start a bit earlier than normal... so I'm hoping we have a few more weeks of good rains like this one! Joe

I made them with concrete and wooden forms. search my channel videos tab and there is a video on how I made them :) Joe

***** Hey Kevin... yes I have vids on both:) If you go to my channel page and click on videos all the vids are in chronological order.. but here are the links instead:) water diversion box ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-AbNeoxWdqVo.html water weirs ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-ytc3D1r9lXo.html Joe

homesteadonomics Thanks I found the rain water diversion box yesterday after I asked the question but the link to the weir is much appreciated. Great videos, please keep them coming. I think I am going to make a pair of weirs this weekend !

Earthship Chile haha... yep! Got them in the future plans:) thanks for watching EC! Joe

Nancy Stone Thanks Nancy... the root flare is above the soil but below the mulch:)

helidodge thanks HD! It's our monsoon season so it's generally wetter here in july/aug/sept... but I feel for you having no rain in 2 months. Are you up near the panhandle? I have a buddy who lives in Decatur but I guess that's not really that far north considering amarillo/lubbock are more north than that. Joe

homesteadonomics I actually live about 40 miles S of Jack Soirki in Cleburne, and about 60 miles S of your buddy in Decatur. I don't know why they call it North Texas and the panhandle is usually considered part of West Texas. Weird I know, I guess it has to do with the odd shape of the state...

Spirko not "Soirki" stupid spellchecker

helidodge Ah! That's beautiful country there.. you must be close to the Dr. Pepper birthplace? And I'd love to get out to one of Jack's workshops sometime! And yes, sometimes geography can get weird... like when people refer to ohio as 'midwest'..lol! Joe

Hi Ana, That's a good thought and is probably the way to go on spacing of trees. I didn't think too much of that when I planted the trees...lol I just planted them making sure each was 'down slope' of the other. Anyways, great to hear from Portugal :) JOe

Thanks for answering, Joe! :) I'm still working on this project . I figured that if every time I used the water at home only the first two would receive water since is very little flow, so I guess the trick is to collect the water during a whole day and water the trees in the evening or every other day, since I can't store grey water for long. Then I would have more flow. Work-in-progress and all that! ;)

Ana Falé - Just wrote something similar further up. In the South of Portugal (Alentejo/Algarve) it´s a very good strategy to consider soaking pit(s). Using the overflow for the explained purpose like in this video. Aquifers in the region will also thank you. ;-) A filter system for your grey water might also be worth considering. Neither are very troublesome or difficult to implement. BTW Don´t forget the roof water harvesting... Cheers, from a Portuguese in Norway. :-)

my2cents0 I'll trade my rock abundance for your water abundance;) I'd love to live close to that 'freshwater ocean' you guys like to call a lake!!! lol And I can't see Russia either... but I can see Mexico (better food;) Joe

+homesteadonomics haha ........The lake is getting warm, about 63 degrees right now.😬

Yes I let them in there from time to time.. but usually they end up in one of the beds excavating a pepper...lol

+christophe p Hey Christophe, I actually have a video on that box. It gives a good look at the inside and how I built and arranged it. It's titled Rainwater Diversion Box if you click in the videos tab on my channel page:) Joe

One more question...those headers - the ones that regulates the water flow with a board made of concrete - home made or did you get from somewhere? Thanks so much!

Yep, they are homemade and i have a video on them as well. Just look in my videos for DIY water weir or water gate:)

+nun So far it doesn't seem to have an effect on the tree well topsoil. I have a ton of mulch down and that may be the key. But overall it's been awesome for us and I'm looking forward to adding more to it for next year! Thanks for watching Nun and i hope that answered your question! Joe

Zach Hurley Those are some great thoughts for sure... you've been listening to ol' uncle Jack haven't you! The water eventually runs into another swale below the garden where the chickens were and collects under a mesquite tree. I plan to put some more fruit trees down there to take advantage of the overflow... but I have limited water in which to irrigate with for the dry spells... so it's always a balancing act to see what I can reasonably care for:) But I am planning on a large swale system on the backside of the property to be able to install a low head dam and have a mini pond of sorts... for the irrigation of some pomegranates and figs. But I gotta get approval from the CEO (wife;) before I do that one! Anyways, thanks for subbing and glad to have a fellow TSP'r along for the ride! I hope I can keep improving on the vids and hopefully providing good info:) Joe

+Amerijam Acres Yes, it's certainly not perfect, but it accomplishes the goal that I originally set out. I am always looking to improve upon my projects and I appreciate your tips:) I do understand about check dams and slowing the movement of water via swales. However, my primary purpose in this system is to get a little water to each tree in a diverting fashion with each rain.... as well as use the water wiers to control the movement of water during the times that I water with grey water as well. The rain on video was a pretty good event and thus has more water flowing through the system than normal. If you look at the end, the water is much cleaner as the water is more slow flowing after the hard rain finished. anyways, thanks for watching:) Joe

+homesteadonomics don't get me wrong! That's a nice set up. Just thought there could be some improvements for maximum benefit to the system. The more water you can safely trap the better.

Hi AA, don't worry... I didn't take it the wrong way:) I agree with your points totally. I'm still learning in this whole thing and I do truly appreciate any inputs that you and others have:) Most of my projects, especially the permaculture ones, are based mostly on a basic knowledge and a "lets see if this works" kind of mentality. I'm hoping to make improvements and tweaks to all of them at some point. I hope you didn't think I was mad or something...lol... quite the opposite:) I like any input and feedback that I get and it usually helps me to get a better understanding of the whole project in the end. Anyways, thanks for watching and commenting AA:) Joe

+homesteadonomics actually that was more a commentary on me than anything else. I have a bad habit of sounding critical when I'm trying to help. Love the set up.looking forward to more.

+Amerijam Acres I too thought it looked like this water is travelling through your land too quickly. Perhaps deepening and more heavily mulching those first berms into swales would increase water soakage into the whole area of your garden for deep hydration? also rather than using pipes and those gates to direct water at surface level you can dig trenches and fill with hardcore. This will have the same effect at a slower pace and get the water down low where it can soak in. I'm far far away from being any sort of expert though, just my two pence! Seems like you don't get rain all that often but when it falls it really falls, in that situation you want it to get as deep into your land as possible so your benefiting months after the rains stop. Deeep mulch and minimal surface run off are your friends here from what I gather watching geoff's videos!

Hi Prasanthi... we ge approx. 12-14" of rain in a year. The amount that is collected depends on catchment space. Swales and earthworks is hard to say.... as I'm not able to measure it. Off of my roof I can collect 10000 gal during our monsoons. But it ultimately depends on how much we get. Hope that helps:)

Thanks! I'm in Southern Arizona:)