Harvesting H2o (7 page)
A really cool storage container in the bucket category is known as a
water brick
. These are stackable 3-5 gallon containers that look like the 5-gallon drinking water vessels sold in supermarkets, rectangular in shape with handles. Water bricks stack together, however, snapping into place to use storage space efficiently. They stack sideways as well as on top of each other, to eventually make one very large brick out of however many you choose to stack together. They must be filled manually. One advantage is that you only need to pull out and crack one brick at a time when it comes time to access some of your stored water.
Jugs
This is the real do-it-yourself category. Therefore, we need to talk about sanitizing. If you are reusing jugs that used to contain something other than potable water, they need to be cleaned
and
sanitized. Please note cleaning is not the same thing as sanitizing. Cleaning should be done with plain old dishwashing soap, hot water, and elbow grease until the vessel appears sparkling clean. Then you need to sanitize it. Theoretically, the hot water from your sink should sanitize it, if the water is hot enough. But plastic containers may have scratches in them where bacteria can hide. Therefore, a cheap sanitizing solution should be used and then rinsed with hot water. Mix one ounce (or one shot glass) of household bleach per five gallons of water for your sanitizing solution, and allow 15 minutes of contact in each plastic vessel. Then rinse them well with hot water.
The moonshiners on television may still use plastic milk cartons, but that is not the best choice for storing potable water because the expected shelf life is only a few years. Much better are plastic PET bottles, which have a very long expected shelf life. If you drink diet soda from these things, save them up and then clean and sanitize both the bottles and the caps before re-using them. Otherwise, you can buy them online brand new (probably from a homebrew supply store).
Canning jars are good for storing water. This is something many doomsday preppers are likely to have on hand already. I would boil the water before adding it to canning jars, just like you do when you are pickling. Screw the lid on the jars after pouring in the boiling water (using an oven mitt) quickly, and it will form an airtight seal that will be just as hard to get off as a pickle jar lid when you want the water. Let the jars cool naturally and slowly; if you subject them to cold water to try to cool them they will break.
Other Interesting Water Gadgets
Let’s close the book by looking at a few neat gadgets which didn’t quite fit in to any of the other chapters, but may be interesting enough to pursue. If you have any suggestions for additions to this section, please email them to me and I may include them in revised editions, giving you proper credit. You can contact me through my Amazon Author page.
Solar Stills
I briefly suggested a simple version of this in the chapter on
Other Sources of Water in the Wild
, forcing thick plant leaves to condensate by placing them in a hole in the ground around a bucket with a plastic tarp stretched over the top of the hole. If you want to get serious and do this right, the process is known as a making a
solar still
. You don’t even need any plant leaves to produce water this way, although adding them will increase your yield somewhat. There is usually enough moisture in the soil alone to create about a pint of water per day (per still) using this method. Solar stills work best when the days are hot but the nights are cold, such as in the southern deserts during sunny winter days.
You need a large sheet of plastic tarp, such as a 12’ x 12’ painter’s drop cloth. You then need to dig a conical-shaped hole that is about 8-9 feet in diameter. A pot or bucket is placed at the very bottom of the hole, preferably mostly buried in its own small hole. The depth of the hole from ground-level to the rim of the bucket should be about two feet.
Now you need to arrange the plastic sheet over the hole so it forms an inverted cone. This can be done by placing a rock in the middle of the sheet, so it sets just above the bucket at the bottom of the hole. You want to have about 6 inches of clearance between the low point of the plastic sheet under the rock and the rim of the bucket. The entire sheet must be suspended above the sides of the hole. Secure the edges of the sheet on the ground outside the hole somehow, perhaps by using bigger rocks. Seal it the best you can to keep the wind from flapping the plastic
During the heat of the day, condensation will form on the underside of the plastic sheet. Because it is angled down toward the center, the beads of newly-formed water will run down and finally collect at the low point, where it will all drip off into the bucket. After a few days, you will have sucked all the moisture out of that hole and will need to dig another one to transfer the tarp to.
Theoretically, this is distilled water that is collected and can be drunk directly. Practically, I would treat the water before consuming it.
Pocket Water Filters
What a day and age we live in. You can purchase lightweight, portable water filters which weigh less than two pounds. These are a great gadget for hikers and campers. They are powered by a built-in hand pump and can output as much as a quart per minute. The filters are fine and include embedded silver particles in them; some also have carbon elements. I have read that the average expected filter life is more than 12,000 gallons. This device can make drinking water from most sources of water in the wild, removing all bacteria, protozoa, and small particles including pollen. They will not remove all viruses, however; therefore, it is best to get the source water from a moving stream or recently deposited rainwater from rock depressions. Two popular manufactures are Katadyn and MSR.
Ultraviolet Water Purifiers
Another type of water purification system uses ultraviolet rays to destroy pathogens. This is, in effect, a radiation treatment. It should be noted that the microorganisms in the water are not removed by this method, just killed – or more accurately stated, deactivated. It is possible for them to reactivate after this treatment, so water purified by UV rays should be consumed quickly. Better yet, filter it after the UV treatment.
Short-wave UV rays are used to treat the water. They do not occur naturally (underneath the atmosphere layer of the earth, anyway) and are produced electronically inside the water-purifier devices. These purifier gadgets are typically cylindrical in shape and come in all different sizes, from huge industrial-sized units to small portable ones that run on battery power. You must have access to electricity to run these, one way or another.
Water goes in one end of the tube, is treated inside with the UV rays, and comes out the other. The flow rate is surprisingly fast, as the water only needs enough treatment time for the light to come into contact with everything in the water. For that reason, however, only reasonably clear water can effectively be treated with ultraviolet rays.
Micro-Purification
There are some purification products being sold which are designed for treating very small batches, such as a single glass of drinking water. One such product that has already been touched upon somewhat is the water purification tablet. This is nothing more than a chlorine or iodine pill which dissolves in water. Make sure you use the proper mix ratio. Given a choice, I would lean toward the chlorine tablets, being as iodine can have harmful long-term health effects. Water purification tablets are not practical for home-water treatment because they are so much more expensive than simply using household bleach (and for storage purposes, the Calcium Hypochlorite granule form is preferred). However, they do come in handy when hiking or travelling in the wild. A canteen can be safely refilled with wild water by first coarse-filtering the water through a cotton shirt or towel, and then purifying the contents of the canteen by dropping in a tablet.
I found a news story on a product now under development in Europe known as the
Nano Tea Bag
water purifier. The press releases do not describe exactly what the scientific process is; only that activated carbon is involved and somehow the bags “suck in” and trap all the impurities. One tea bag can supposedly treat up to one liter of water. This should be an interesting product to watch.
About the Author
Nicholas Hyde is a scholar, researcher, and enthusiastic hobbyist. He writes how-to articles and eBooks on a wide range of topics that interest him, from home brewing to survival techniques (actually he considers home brewing to be a survival technique). His style is one that presents a practical education on the topic at hand, which enables the reader to approach their project with both the knowledge necessary to succeed, and the enthusiasm to enjoy it. Hyde lives in Southern California with his wife and writes when he is not kayak fly-fishing.
Books by Nicholas Hyde
Preparing for Off-Grid Survival
: How to live a self-sufficient, modern-day life off the grid
Harvesting H2o
: A prepper's guide to the collection, treatment, and storage of drinking water while living off the grid.
Table of Contents
The Dangers of Drinking Wild Water
Land-Based Marine Water Makers
Other Sources of Water in the Wild
Practical Water Storage Solutions
