A storm! & Update on the Side Yard

A storm!

The side yard is finished! And just in time too -- we were blessed by a big thunderstorm 2 days ago (8/1/2015) that dropped 1.2 inches into the nearby Ward III Office rain gauge in about an hour (Madeline is the Monsoon squad volunteer manager for the rain garden there, so we went and checked it out right after the storm ended). What a thunder and lightening show! Here's a photo from just before the storm hit:

Grant Road as the storm just started to hit.

According to NOAA Atlas 14 data (http://hdsc.nws.noaa.gov/hdsc/pfds/), this ~1 inch, 60 minute storm equates to about a 2 year recurrence interval storm. So a pretty good event.

We visited the Rillito a bit later, that once perennially-flowing river bed, which had a pretty substantial amount of water in it. The USGS gauging station just 2 or 3 miles downstream at La Cholla didn't register any discharge all day, though. I find it hard to believe that the amount of water we saw flowing would infiltrate in 3 miles, so I'm not sure what's going on there.

Madeline overlooking the Rillito, post storm

Culvert draining 1st Ave into the Rillito

Update on the Side Yard

 In addition to being fed by our bathtub, the basin we built on the side of the house also receives rain water from a pretty big portion of the roof -- I don't remember if I mentioned that in the last post. Well, the rain from this storm filled the basin and overflowed it -- good thing we designed for that to happen! The good folks at Watershed Management Group (WMG) will always tell you, so will I and just about everyone else I've met doing this - plan for the overflow! It will happen, it's just a matter of when. Some photos of standing water after the storm ended:

At the farthest downstream end of the basin, right above the overflow (not pictured)

Right by the greywater outflow pipe and rainwater downspout (not pictured, at right)

We also attached more strings to the trellises to guide the vines up -- after a day, the plants are already growing up them and the strings are taut!

Arizona Grape

Passion Fruit Vine

Milkweed Vine in the foreground

The 2-face shrine, a gift from Chris to Madeline that she installed opposite the rain down spout. I'm creeped out by it.

Madeline made a nice bridge out of some random 2x4's lying around the yard. We'd like to put a little arched bridge over the trough instead, a la Japanese style, so if anyone has any leads on one of those let us know. Notice the little 2-face shrine to the right. One real quick thing on the greywater outflow pipe that I didn't mention last time is that the outflow is covered by a metal sock screen to prevent critters from crawling up it. These are pretty nifty screens, just thought I'd let everyone know about their existence. Got them at Ace Hardware.

New bridge over the trough connecting the rainwater downspout and greywater outflow with the basin

The "Lint Snare" -- we place over the outflow pipe to prevent critters from crawling up it

Our rain barrels were filled to the max and also overflowed, but we didn't plan for that over flow. Oops!!! Not following our own advice. That made for a messy sidewalk and standing water for a few hours. Yesterday, I created a new basin that we can later run an overflow pipe to, which will hopefully solve that issue. I'll document it in a future post.

Thanks for reading! The next edition will cover the work party we held about a month ago. :)