_I don't know about you, but all this sunny weather has made me too happy the past few months!  We need some dreary rainy weather for a few months to balance out these biological highs I've been experiencing.  I'm getting really tired of seeing those big high pressure systems sitting over the western United States.  Lets face it, we need rain!  October started out with a few inches of rain, but its been sunny ever since.  November and December are supposed to be two of the five wettest months we experience in Central California, but this year nada, zilch, nothing but Sun!  YUK.  We need some rain.  Lets all start thinking about rain.  Lets start meditating and reduce the stress level around here.  Once the stress level is relieved, the high pressure will go away, and the low pressure in our lives will usher in some rain!  I know it doesn't work like that, really!  But, geez, I'm ready for some nice rain to fill my rain tanks.  Today I'm going to use the last 500 gallons collected in October to water my parched plants one last time and then I need some help from Mother Nature!

This was a sign we saw on our recent trip to the Animal Kingdom Park at Disney World!  We thought Ellen Degeneres might get a kick out of it?  What? No Dancing?  Just because we were on a moving vehicle with no windows out among lots of wild creatures shouldn't mean we can't celebrate! 

It is very important for those of you who have implemented rainwater harvesting systems with a first flush mechanism to keep the first flush clean!  I visited a site I installed 2 years ago and thought I would do the owner a favor by checking their first flush.  I found the first flush was very full of sediment and hadn't been cleaned recently as best I could tell.  The roof catchment area sits under a few oak trees so it is a site that requires maintenance on a regular basis.  In this case the gutters don't have any gutter guards either so the Leaf Eater is the primary screening mechanism and then the first flush.  The first flush was so full of "gunk" it basically wasn't working any longer.  The "ball" inside the first flush was frozen inside the 4" pipe.  When we checked the tanks they had a lot of sediment sitting in the bottom.  Needless to say we cleaned out the first flush and left it in excellent working order.  So remember, if you have a system with a first flush it is important to clean it out on a regular basis.  Otherwise it will stop serving its purpose and the sediment will be flowing directly to the tanks.  Cleaning them will save you time and money in the long run.  After discussion with the owner he told me, "We had the attack of the oak moths this year along with the nasty caterpillars whose droppings are called frass and is the consistency of fine sand and it was all over the place. That's what clogged the filters. I do clean the small filters regularly and I thought there was a large filter but I couldn't unscrew the cap."  The owner brought up a good point.  The first flush devices have a cap at the bottom with plastic threads.  I have seen where they bind over time and become difficult to remove without a strap wrench.  In this case we actually did remove them with a strap wrench before we cleaned them.  Since this installation I have begun to use a toilet wax ring as a lubricant on the plastic threads.  It helps to resolve the binding problem.  Basically you can buy the toilet bowl wax ring at any hardware store.  You scrape off a portion of the wax and apply it to the plastic threads.  I learned this from a plumber who has helped me in the past.  Therefore part of the problem was not originally installing with the wax to make it easier to spin off the caps.  I have changed my process to always use this when I install now.  I have also updated my maintenance information on this website because over time applying wax will be required again as part of the standard maintenance process.  In regards to the oak moths and caterpillar frass, it is important to clean more often when extraordinary debris situations occur.   It was a good lesson for both the owner and the installer (me)!  In addition the owner is going to install Leaf Solution gutter screens.  This will make a huge difference by keeping debris out of the system.

Another of my favorite signs was in the window of the Hard Rock Cafe on Charlotte Street, Nassau, Bahamas.  We visited there the first time in 2005 and it caught my eye immediately.  Nothing else, just sharing!

_At the October Design and Construction Class held by ARCSA in Portland, Oregon I was listening to Billy Kniffen talk about how the water in a tank could be siphoned out of the tank through the first flush device.  I had not heard about that previously.  As water is flowing through a wet conveyance to a calming inlet a siphon effect could occur.  If you have ever siphoned gas out of a gas tank or similar situation you know that once you create the siphon effect the liquid will pull itself from a higher location to a lower location.  Since a first flush device is set up with an emitter to automatically release its contents overtime, it could then be the place where all the water in the tank is siphoned back up the calming inlet through the conveyance mechanism and out the first flush.  To eliminate this problem you drill a hole in the top of the calming inlet which allows air to enter and break any siphon effect from occurring.  At the last installation we finished the design and tested it by filling the conveyance mechanism with municipal hose water through the leaf eater, which filled the first flush, then filled the wet conveyance until it overflowed into the calming inlet inside the tank.  Next we drilled the anti-siphon hole at the top of the calming inlet and an audible suction release was heard.  Thank you Billy Kniffen and ARCSA for sharing your knowledge and training!