As promised, today we measured our water accumulation after completing one month with a fully functioning rain water catchment system and it’s requisite rain. This month we had the family for Thanksgiving, we have showered and bathed as we felt, we have washed dishes when they were dirty and our clothes when we wanted. We have used water willy nilly without any care or regard just to see how much we could use if we weren’t worrying about it.  The results are in.

We began October with 2100 gallons of water in the tanks. We have used an average of 42 gallons per day with a total consumption in October of 1286 gallons. This morning our tanks are sitting at 4000 gallons. Drum roll please…. We caught 3186 gallons in the month! This week we will move some of that water down to the two 500 gallon tanks in the garden, close them up and forget about them til the summer. I should think we will have no problem filling all of the tanks (8500 gallons)  by the end of November. Won’t that be a great position to be in….

In addition to a guest room and a deck, the big objective for the reno was to perfect the systems. Living off grid it is all about systems and while we wanted to take advantage of  what nature provides for free (the sun and rain),  we need it to be simple. The new systems weren’t cheap but if we live here long enough, keeping in mind that I am very very (very) young, the new systems should pay off when we track the benefits in our propane bills.

I had been telling you about the sealions feeding at the cut when the fish are coming thru. I don’t remember if I ever showed you this video, it was a while ago, but you can see why the sea lions and seals hang around here. This is a sea lion swimming under the water with the fish trying to get away.

E strained his back last week chainsawing logs and is currently walking like his Grandmother used to do… We have taken the last couple of days off. This reminds me of another benefit of reduced propane usage.. E’s back hates carrying propane onto the island so we work to avoid the need for propane at all costs. We both want to keep

E’s back happy