Earth Camp Commitment

My name is Zack Wellington and my Earth Camp commitment is to use water harvesting at my house. I will set up a roof gutter system and direct the rain water from my roof into large barrels.  I will use that water to water the plants at my house. It doesn't rain much here which is why it is important to harvest all the available precipitation, which is free water.

What motivated me to make my Earth Camp commitment were some of the places that we visited during bike day. During bike day we talked about different types of irrigating, drip irrigation, flood irrigation, and water harvesting. Two places that we stopped at that used water harvesting were the U of A's visitor center and Brad Lancaster's house. These were the places that motivated me the most. 

To make my Earth Camp commitment come to life I will first, get my uncle to help me. after I have my uncle's help we will set out a plan to set up the gutters and see how we will direct the water into the containers we will hold it in. Next we will go to the hardware store and buy the materials we don't have already. And last we will se up the system early in the morning and my commitment will be set up and ready to work. 

The world will be different due to my Earth Camp commitment because my family wont use so much of the water that Arizona gets from the Colorado River and its aquifer. We will instead be using the free water that we can collect from the rain coming off our roof runoff.

I know that what you need to remember is not setting up the gutter system but remembering to use the water that you collect. So to remember this I plan to put a small poster on my door so when I wake up I will see the poster and it will remind me to go out and water the plants with the harvested water. 

Questions & Answers

What did you think camp would be like and did it turn out that way or differently?

I thought Earth Camp would be pretty much exactly how it turned out. I figured it would very fun and an amazing experience and turned out to be just like that.

What was your favorite activity and why?

My favorite activity was when we went to Kitt  Peak. I liked Kitt Peak because I've always liked looking at the stars. I learned a lot of the names and how to find certain constellations. 

What did we do at camp that impressed you the most and why?

What impressed me the most was when Amy was telling us that we were 20 of the only 80 people that got to harvest the saguaro fruit at that location every year.  Only a very small amount of people get to do the harvest, and I felt very special to be one of them.