This information is provided by property owner Trinity Cosby. Thanks, Trin.

Water Catchment:

Generally speaking, water is the hardest thing (next to shade) to come by in the desert. You basically have 5 major choices that are listed below in order of cost.

Well Drilling:
This is your most expensive option. You will be looking at roughly ,000 to drill and case the well; ,000 or so for the pump, pressure pump, and pressure tank; and either an electrical connection or a small solar/wind system with battery bank.

Catchment Systems
This option will be discussed in greater detail below. A water catchment system routes rain water from a surface into a holding tank. It is a good long term solution to supplement your water supply, if done correctly and left alone for a while, it can become your primary water
supply. This along with the next entry are the cheapest reliable water sources.

Water Importing
You can purchase water for a reasonable fee from the ranch offices, you will need to bring your own containers, sign in at the ranch office, procure a key, and fill them yourself. Larger amounts of water (for an on-site tank, etc) can be purchased through a number of water suppliers
and brought in via water truck.

Natural Springs
This entry along with the next one are both free, but will not provide a great deal of water, and should be looked at for emergency use only. If you are lucky enough to have a natural spring on your land, it is a trivial matter to build a 3-4 foot long casement pipe and have a clear source of water. You probably will not receive much water using this method, and your water will most likely be contaminated by heavy amounts of minerals, vegetation, and animal pollutants.

Plant Extraction
In a major emergency, you can build a solar distiller out of a garbage bag, and use prickly pear or other well saturated plants as a water source. You can also strip the thorns from the prickly pear and eat them as is.

Now let’s get on to the basics of water catchment and usage. A water catchment system in its most basic form consists of a catchment area (roof, satellite dish, large plastic sheets, etc), a delivery system (pipes, gutters, etc), a debris filter (hardware cloth for large objects, with a fine mesh screen after it for small objects), and a storage system (barrels, water trough, old hot water tank, sealed
bathtub, etc).

You can build a water catchment system for free if you are lucky enough to find a place to scrounge up the parts, but a decent inexpensive system can be built for around 0.

Parts List:
1 8 foot solid satellite dish
OR
1 8 foot metal mesh or screen satellite dish
1 10 foot by 10 foot tarp
AND
1 55 gallon barrel with removable lid
1 2 foot by 2 foot fine mesh screen (window screen or similar)

Remove the feed horn from the satellite dish if it is still attached, and remove all mounting hardware so that you are left with just the parabolic dish. If using a non solid dish, drape the tarp over it, pull the center of the tarp through the hole, cut the portion protruding through the hole, and run a length of line or duct tape around the edge of the dish to secure the tarp to it. Sit your barrel upright with the lid removed, place the screen over it, and place the satellite dish on top of it. You now have a very basic, but effective, water catchment system. Total cost should be around .

A much better system can be built if you already have a catchment surface (roof of a house, barn, shed, etc). Install gutters, link 3 barrels together along the bottom, route the output from the gutters to the barrel, and put a screen filter in place.

The math is easy enough.
Measure your catchment area
Multiply the length times the width
Divide your answer by 1.667
This will give you an answer that approximates how many gallons of water you will collect per inch of rain received.

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