Spent $40 on a hand pump and it saved my garden, but $300 on a rain barrel was a waste

Karen Hill · 2026-10-13T08:10:03.373498+00:00

During the dry stretch here in Fort Worth last summer, my rain barrel ran dry in 3 weeks and my tomatoes died anyway, but the cheap hand pump I rigged to a 5 gallon bucket kept my basil alive all season. The barrel felt like the responsible choice at the time, and it just sat there empty while the bucket did the actual work. Has anyone found a rain setup that actually holds up when it stops raining for a solid stretch?

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Spent $40 on a hand pump and it saved my garden, but $300 on a rain barrel was a waste | Anthropocene Anxieties - Thought Shares