Pecan Spring Ranch
Overview
- Category: Agricultural
- Organization Location: Menard and McCulloch Counties, Texas
- Activity: UMakes use of history to supply water to their livestock, gardens, and area wildlife.
Background
Pecan Spring Ranch has transformed its Red Barn, a Dutch barn built around 1898, into the catchment surface for their system by retrofitting it with metal roofing and 12-inch stainless steel box gutters on each side. The ranch’s rainwater collection system consists of three storage areas: a 25,000-gallon covered rock tank, a 1,000-gallon stainless steel tank, and a 2,000-gallon clay-lined surface water pond, for a combined storage total of 28,000 gallons. Rainwater fills the tanks first before overflow is piped underground to the pond, which also collects surface runoff. Collecting rainwater has saved Pecan Spring Ranch money by reducing the need to use and maintain the existing water well, which also reduces reliance on local groundwater and eliminated the need and cost of drilling a new well.