High Elevation Gardening Web Log "Blog"

Lancaster asserts that water scarcity results when people treat rainwater as a nuisance in the home and municipal landscapes by shunting it off the land through impermeable city streets and into storm sewers. The path to water abundance begins with landscape designs and sustainable systems that encourage rain to infiltrate the soil through the watershed, nourishing plant life, people and ecosystems. This inspiring presentation shares eight universal principles of water harvesting along with simple strategies that turn water scarcity into water abundance. They empower citizens to create integrated water-sustainable landscape plans at home and throughout the community. Rainwater harvesting is the process of capturing rain and making the most of it as close as possible to where it falls. Greywater harvesting is the process of directing water from the household sink, bathtub, shower and washing machine drains into the soils of the landscape where the water is naturally filtered and reused to generate more on-site resources. The two work hand in hand. He'll give examples of enhanced local food security, passive cooling of cities in summer, reduced costs of living and energy consumption, erosion & flood control, revitalization of dead waterways, minimized water pollution, groundwater recharge, community building, and more.

Living on an eighth of an acre in downtown Tucson, where rainfall is less than 12 inches annually, Brad and his brother Rodd harvest over 100,000 gallons of rainwater a year. They have turned a barren urban lot in Tucson into a thriving, green, food producing landscape with summer temperatures 10 degrees below that of their neighbors. Brad Lancaster is a permaculture teacher, designer, consultant and co-founder of Desert Harvesters
(http://www.DesertHarvesters.org). He has taught programs for the ECOSA Institute, Columbia University, U of AZ, Prescott College, Audobon Expeditions and many others. He has helped design
integrated water harvesting and permaculture systems for homeowners and gardeners, including the Tucson Audobon Simpson Farm restoration site, and the
Milagro and Stone Curves housing developments.