Rainwater Harvesting for Drylands and Beyond by Brad Lancaster

Community planting of new street-side, water-harvesting basins in the public right-of-way of West University neighborhood – Tucson, AZ
2025-02-16 09:00 - 12:00 (America/Phoenix)
Come help us plant six new street-side, water-harvesting, eddy basins at the SW corner of 1st Street and 5th Avenue— an installation in the public commons, planted and stewarded by the participating public.
This planting of rain, trees, understory, & wildflowers is occurring in the West University neighborhood, but the planting event is open to anyone from any neighborhood, and is a great opportunity to see how such an event, or other Neighborhood Forester endeavors, could be organized elsewhere.

Date: Sunday, February 16, 2025.
The stormwater eddy basins (each having over 4,500-gallon annual capacity) were just completed – so now we can plant. Got to plant the rain before we plant the plants!
Time: 9:00 am for a planting demonstration, then keep going to various parts of the neighborhood. The demonstration will show you how to plant the rain to maximize its potential, how to plant food-bearing native trees by seed and/or with nursery stock to maximize passive summer shading/cooling, and how to recycle/plant prunings and leaves as fertility-building, carbon-sequestering, pollutant-filtering, water-harvesting mulch.
End time of noon is approximate (with a good showing of folks we’ll likely finish up early).
Cost: FREE—plus your planting help

Meeting spot:
SW corner of 1st Street and 5th Avenue (945 N. 5th Ave)
All six basins are next to one another on 1st Street between 5th Ave and N Arizona Avenue.

Come join us in planting native shade trees, understory vegetation, wildflowers, and seed within or beside water-harvesting earthworks in the public rights-of-way. The idea is to plant native food-producing, flood-controlling, wildlife-habitat-producing, beautiful, air- and water-filtering, living air conditioners. Street trees that shade up to 75% of the street’s surface can also cool summer neighborhood temperatures by up to 20ºF.
This enhances the walkability and bikeability of our neighborhoods, which improves health and drops crime. When we harvest street runoff to irrigate the street trees, we reduce water consumption as we reduce downstream flooding we naturally bioremediate/filter pollutants, and help indirectly and directly recharge our groundwater. Thus far this annual event has resulted in over 1,700 trees being planted in our neighborhood/waterhood, thousands of understory plants, and contributed to annually harvesting over one million gallons of stormwater that used to go to the stormdrain—let’s keep going!

What to bring: Work clothes, sun hat, gloves, and water as we’ll be working outdoors. A pointed shovel, pruning tools, and/or hard rake would also be great (and we’ll have some extra tools on hand for those lacking them).

For info and photos from past plantings see here

For more info on our Annual Neighborhood Rain, Tree, & Food Forest Planting see here

We will have two more such plantings either late February or March once we finish more street-side basins—check back to our Events page for when we post the dates and times.

For more info on these and many other water harvesting strategies, check out the full-color, revised editions of Rainwater Harvesting for Drylands and Beyond available at deep discount direct from the author Brad Lancaster.

Water Harvesting Design Certification Course – Tucson, Arizona
2025-03-10 - 2025-03-15
For more info on this Watershed Management Group course, plus how to register see:
https://watershedmg.org/event/water-harvesting-design-certification-march-2025
Brad will teach March 10 or 11, and he will also offer a guided tour of his place and some of his neighborhood’s rain-irrigated native food forest work, Sunday March 16th.
Sign up for the tour once it is posted on Brad’s Events page.

Grassland Restoration Workshop utilizing water-harvesting, erosion-control strategies at Buenos Aires Wildlife Refuge, Altar Valley, Arizona
2025-03-15 09:00
See the flyer for details.
Strategies we will teach and build include: rock-mulch rundowns, one-rock dams, sheet flow collectors (media lunas horns down), sheet flow spreaders (media lunas horns up), and plug and spread – all of these are explained with case studies in the full-color edition “Rainwater Harvesting for Drylands and Beyond, Volume 2, 2nd Edition“.
These strategies work well in rural, suburban, and urban settings.
Register at avcarestorationworkshop.eventbrite.com.

Be prepared to be outdoors all day, dress accordingly. Bring gloves and simple hand tools such as pointed shovel if you have them. Otherwise we’ll have extra.
Also bring water and the lunch and snacks you’ll need throughout the day.

Guided Water-Harvesting Home & Neighborhood Block Tour with Brad Lancaster – Tucson, AZ
2025-03-16 09:00 - 11:00
WHEN: 9am – 11am, Sunday, March 16, 2025
WHERE: 813 N. 9th Avenue, Tucson, AZ 85705
COST: $15 per person. Must pay/register in advance. No-shows cannot be refunded.
Limited number of spaces. First paid, first served.
SOLD OUT.
Check back on this Events page for future tours.
We regularly do fall tours and a late winter tour.
Come tour with the guy who wrote the books on water harvesting and more!
Brad Lancaster, author of the just released, full-color, revised editions of his award-winning books “Rainwater Harvesting for Drylands and Beyond, Volumes 1 and 2” will guide this tour of he and his brother’s family’s water-harvesting & landscape design award-winning 1/8th-acre urban property and surrounding block of the neighborhood.
100,000 gallons of rain and stormwater is harvested annually on the property and in the adjoining public right-of-way. You’ll see examples of:
• an integrated “tiny house” where a one-car garage was converted into a cottage or “garottage” that passive heats and cools itself for free with well-designed winter sun access & summer shading. 75% of its building materials were salvaged from the waste stream;
• solar cooking, solar water heating, and solar power;
• legal & inexpensive site-built composting toilets, which helped legalize such toilets state-wide;
• organic gardens getting 95+% of their irrigation needs met by harvested rainwater;
• inexpensive gravity-fed rainwater harvesting systems providing safe & delicious rainwater for all domestic needs including drinking – with no expensive pumps or mechanical filtration systems;
• extensive gravity-fed greywater harvesting systems turning “waste” waters into resource waters.
• how a joyous 20 plus-years of car-free life has been possible (cargo bicycle is key), and saves over $8,000 annually
In the neighborhood part of the tour you’ll see:
• water-harvesting traffic-calming features that helped turn a dangerous streets into welcoming bicycle boulevards,
• street-runoff harvesting strategies that use street runoff to freely irrigate street trees and control flooding – and new evolutions and improvements on these strategies
• learn how these once “pre-legal” street runoff-harvesting strategies were legalized, rebated, and mandated
• native food forests doubling as wildlife and pollinator corridors that canopy over public foot paths,
• how an annual neighborhood rain and tree planting effort has resulted in the planting of over 1,500 trees and hundreds of understory plants in the neighborhood
• how a county grant helped pay for water-harvesting strategies harvesting over 1 million gallons of annual stormwater in and along the streets
• how a neighborhood-organized Neighborhood Foresters program is training up the neighborhood to steward these features and is implementing more.
• public art & other strategies reclaiming the commons for more life!

Brad will also be selling (at deep discount) & signing copies of the newly released & revised, full-color editions of his award-winning books; and Plant the Rain t-shirts, caps, and stickers.

For self-guided water tours in Tucson see:
https://www.harvestingrainwater.com/tour/

Here is a video of a 2016 tour of my place (more evolutions have since occurred)…

Community planting of new street-side, water-harvesting basins in the public right-of-way of Dunbar/Spring neighborhood – Tucson, AZ
2025-04-19 07:00 - 10:00
WHEN: 7am – 10am, Saturday, April 19, 2025
WHERE: 224 W. 2nd Street, Tucson, AZ

Come help us plant six new street-side, water-harvesting, eddy basins along 2nd Street (and University Blvd) — an installation in the public commons, planted and stewarded by the participating public.
This planting of rain, trees, understory, & wildflowers is occurring in the Dunbar/Spring neighborhood, but the planting event is open to anyone from any neighborhood, and is a great opportunity to see how such an event, or other Neighborhood Forester endeavors, could be organized elsewhere.

Date: Saturday, April 19, 2025.
The stormwater eddy basins (each having over 4,500-gallon annual capacity) are being wrapped up now – so now we can plant. Got to plant the rain before we plant the plants!
Time: 7:00 am for a planting demonstration led by Brad Lancaster, then keep going to various parts of the neighborhood. The demonstration will show you how to plant the rain to maximize its potential, how to plant food-bearing native trees by seed and/or with nursery stock to maximize passive summer shading/cooling, and how to recycle/plant prunings and leaves as fertility-building, carbon-sequestering, pollutant-filtering, water-harvesting mulch.
End time of ten is approximate (with a good showing of folks we’ll likely finish up early).
Cost: FREE—plus your planting help
Meeting spot:
224 W. 2nd Street
Five of the six basins are within a half block of one another on 2nd Street. The one on University Blvd is at 40 W. University Blvd—we’ll do that one last

Come join us in planting native shade trees, understory vegetation, wildflowers, and seed within or beside water-harvesting earthworks in the public rights-of-way. The idea is to plant native food-producing, flood-controlling, wildlife-habitat-producing, beautiful, air- and water-filtering, living air conditioners. Street trees that shade up to 75% of the street’s surface can also cool summer neighborhood temperatures by up to 20ºF.
This enhances the walkability and bikeability of our neighborhoods, which improves health and drops crime. When we harvest street runoff to irrigate the street trees, we reduce water consumption as we reduce downstream flooding we naturally bioremediate/filter pollutants, and help indirectly and directly recharge our groundwater. Thus far this annual event has resulted in over 1,700 trees being planted in our neighborhood/waterhood, thousands of understory plants, and contributed to annually harvesting over one million gallons of stormwater that used to go to the stormdrain—let’s keep going!
Thanks to Little John Excavating for doing the basin excavation, Churchman Sand & Gravel for the catalina granite rock, and Dryland Design for doing the excellent rockwork.

What to bring: Work clothes, sun hat, gloves, and water as we’ll be working outdoors. A pointed shovel, pruning tools, and/or hard rake would also be great (and we’ll have some extra tools on hand for those lacking them).

ALSO COME TO OUR next planting event in the West University neighborhood in one to two weeks.
Details coming soon

For info and photos from past plantings see here

For more info on our Annual Neighborhood Rain, Tree, & Food Forest Planting see here

For more info on these and many other water harvesting strategies, check out the full-color, revised editions of Rainwater Harvesting for Drylands and Beyond available at deep discount direct from the author Brad Lancaster.

Arizona Illustrated Native Plants Screening & Panel - Tucson, AZ
2025-04-19 13:00 - 14:30
WHERE: ENR2 building, University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ

Brad Lancaster will be part of the screening’s panel moderated by Tony Paniagua.
More info in the link below.
www.azpm.org/plants

Community planting of new street-side, water-harvesting basins in the public rights-of-ways of Dunbar/Spring & West University neighborhoods – Tucson, AZ
2025-04-27 07:00 - 10:00
WHEN: 7am – 10am, Sunday, April 27, 2025
WHERE: We start 7am on the south (2nd Street) side of 902 N. 10th Avenue in the Dunbar/Spring neighborhood.
Then around 8am we plan to plant a basin on the west (2nd Ave) side of 612 E. 2nd Street in the West University neighborhood.

Come help us plant two large new street-side, water-harvesting, eddy basins — installations in the public commons, planted and stewarded by the participating public.
This planting of rain, trees, understory, & wildflowers is occurring in the Dunbar/Spring & West University neighborhoods, but the planting event is open to anyone from any neighborhood, and is a great opportunity to see how such an event, or other Neighborhood Forester endeavors, could be organized elsewhere.

Date: Sunday, April 27, 2025.
The stormwater eddy basins (each having over 4,500-gallon annual capacity) are being wrapped up now – so now we can plant. Got to plant the rain before we plant the plants!
Time: 7:00 am for a planting demonstration led by Brad Lancaster and community planting, then we’ll keep going to the next basin. The demonstration will show you how to plant the rain to maximize its potential, how to plant food-bearing native trees by seed and/or with nursery stock to maximize passive summer shading/cooling, and how to recycle/plant prunings and leaves as fertility-building, carbon-sequestering, pollutant-filtering, water-harvesting mulch.
End time of ten is approximate (with a good showing of folks we’ll likely finish up early).
Cost: FREE—plus your planting help
Meeting spot:
South side of 902 N. 10th Avenue
in the Dunbar/Spring neighborhood
Then with that site planted we will move to the west side of
612 E. 2nd Street in the West University neighborhood

Come join us in planting native shade trees, understory vegetation, wildflowers, and seed within or beside water-harvesting earthworks in the public rights-of-way. The idea is to plant native food-producing, flood-controlling, wildlife-habitat-producing, beautiful, air- and water-filtering, living air conditioners.
Street trees that shade up to 75% of the street’s surface can also cool summer neighborhood temperatures by up to 20ºF.
This enhances the walkability and bikeability of our neighborhoods, which improves health and drops crime. When we harvest street runoff to irrigate the street trees, we reduce water consumption as we reduce downstream flooding we naturally bioremediate/filter pollutants, and help indirectly and directly recharge our groundwater. Thus far this annual event has resulted in over 1,700 trees being planted in our neighborhood/waterhood, thousands of understory plants, and contributed to annually harvesting over one million gallons of stormwater that used to go to the stormdrain—let’s keep going!
Thanks to Little John Excavating for doing the basin excavation, Churchman Sand & Gravel for the catalina granite rock, and Dryland Design for doing the excellent rockwork.

What to bring: Work clothes, sun hat, gloves, and water as we’ll be working outdoors. A pointed shovel, pruning tools, and/or hard rake would also be great (and we’ll have some extra tools on hand for those lacking them).

ALSO COME TO OUR next planting event in the West University neighborhood in one to two weeks.
Details coming soon

For info and photos from past plantings see here

For more info on our Annual Neighborhood Rain, Tree, & Food Forest Planting see here

For more info on these and many other water harvesting strategies, check out the full-color, revised editions of Rainwater Harvesting for Drylands and Beyond available at deep discount direct from the author Brad Lancaster.

Brad Lancaster water-harvesting presentation followed by Q and A and book signing - Sedona, AZ
2025-05-08 17:30 - 19:30
Prior to Brad’s talk at 6pm, there will be a screening of Episode 4: Country roads, City Roads” from the 5-part documentary series “Thinking Like Water“.
This episode shows how water-whisperer Bill Zeedyk and those he has mentored are transforming dirt roads, paved roads, and driveways that dehydrate and devegetate the land, into roads that rehydrate and revegetate the land, while also reducing flooding, erosion, and costs of the roads themselves.

Brad’s presentation then starts at 7pm

Planting the rain to grow abundance
Simple and effective ways to create true oases that enhance the health and hydrology of our communities

This dynamic presentation shares patterns and strategies to harvest, integrate, and enliven free local resources—such as rain-, grey-, and stormwaters; along with soil fertility, wild foods, and community fun—in a way that generates far more potential than the sum of their parts. Scarcity is re-visioned and transformed into abundance simply through creative cycling and utilization of what is already at hand. Costly and consuming habits and infrastructure, disconnected from their surroundings, are reoriented and reconnected to maximize enriching opportunities.
You’ll see many examples of such transformation, including how once-dying wetlands and creek flows are being regenerated with simple hand-built structures made of on-site materials; and how once-blighted, overheated neighborhood streets are being rejuvenated into thriving greenbelts of water, people, wildlife, art, food, and celebration by planting once-drained stormwater, seed, and yard prunings.
This talk is both an invitation for you to engage and partner with your natural surroundings and community, and a treasure map showing you the way—by planting the rain, dancing with the sun, growing fertile shade, and more—to live as one of your community’s inspirational sparks!
(Duration: 1 hour plus Q&A and book signing afterward)

Cost for the just screening and Brad’s talk is $22
More info and tickets here

Location:
Sedonya
Conscious Living Center
120 Deer Trail Drive
Sedona, AZ 86336

Tel. (832) 748-0777

Community planting of new street-side, water-harvesting basins in the public commons of West University neighborhood & Catalina Park – Tucson, AZ
2025-05-10 06:00 - 10:00
WHEN: 6am – 10am, Saturday, May 10, 2025
WHERE: We start 6am on the northwest corner of Catalina Park (5th Avenue and 1st Street)
then head to 3rd Ave and 2nd Street,
and finally 3rd Ave and 1st Street.

Come help us plant six large new street-side, water-harvesting, eddy basins — installations in the public commons, planted and stewarded by the participating public.
This planting of rain, trees, understory, & wildflowers is occurring in the West University neighborhood, but the planting event is open to anyone from any neighborhood, and is a great opportunity to see how such an event, or other Neighborhood Forester endeavors, could be organized elsewhere.
The stormwater eddy basins (each having over 5,000-gallon annual capacity) are being wrapped up now – so now we can plant.
Got to plant the rain before we plant the plants!

We begin with a 6:00 am to beat the heat with a planting demonstration led by Brad Lancaster and community planting, then we’ll keep going to the next basin.
The demonstration will show you how to plant the rain to maximize its potential, how to plant food-bearing native trees and understory plants by seed and/or with nursery stock to maximize passive summer shading/cooling, and how to recycle/plant prunings and leaves as fertility-building, carbon-sequestering, pollutant-filtering, water-harvesting mulch.
End time of ten is approximate (with a good showing of folks we’ll likely finish up early).
Cost: FREE—plus your planting help
Meeting spot:
Southeast corner of 1st Street and 5th Avenue
in the West University neighborhood

Come join us in planting native shade trees, understory vegetation, wildflowers, and seed within or beside water-harvesting earthworks in the public rights-of-way.
The idea is to plant native food-producing, flood-controlling, wildlife-habitat-producing, beautiful, air- and water-filtering, living air conditioners.
Street trees that shade up to 75% of the street’s surface can also cool summer neighborhood temperatures by up to 20ºF.
This enhances the walkability and bikeability of our neighborhoods, which improves health and drops crime. When we harvest street runoff to irrigate the street trees, we reduce water consumption as we reduce downstream flooding we naturally bioremediate/filter pollutants, and help indirectly and directly recharge our groundwater. Thus far this annual event has resulted in over 1,700 trees being planted in our neighborhood/waterhood, thousands of understory plants, and contributed to annually harvesting over one million gallons of stormwater that used to go to the stormdrain—let’s keep going!
Thanks to Little John Excavating for doing the basin excavation, Churchman Sand & Gravel for the catalina granite rock, and Dryland Design for doing addition excavation plus the excellent rock work.

What to bring: Work clothes, sun hat, gloves, and water as we’ll be working outdoors. A pointed shovel, pruning tools, and/or hard rake would also be great (and we’ll have some extra tools on hand for those lacking them).

For info and photos from past plantings see here

For more info on our Annual Neighborhood Rain, Tree, & Food Forest Planting see here

For more info on these and many other water harvesting strategies, check out the full-color, revised editions of Rainwater Harvesting for Drylands and Beyond available at deep discount direct from the author Brad Lancaster.

2025 International Master Gardener Conference
2025-08-25 - 2025-08-28
This is a virtual conference, so you can attend from anywhere.
Get all the details including how to register in the link below:
https://www.imgc2025.com/

Brad Lancaster will be giving a presentation on Day 3 of the conference. See below for presentation description…

Since 1993, Brad has operated a successful permaculture and regenerative design, consulting, and education business rooted in integrated, sustainable approaches to landscape design, planning, and daily living. His journey into this work began with a deep fascination for how we can live in better harmony with our environment—especially in drylands like the Sonoran Desert, where he lives.

This session will include how he got into working with these natural elements—how observing the intense desert climate sparked a passion for harvesting water, capturing shade, and harnessing the sun to create comfort, beauty, and abundance. Through his work and lifestyle, he has developed many fun innovations and shared countless adventures in collaborating with the environment.

Integrated Sun- & Shade-Harvesting for Buildings, Neighborhoods, Gardens, and Landscapes will explore simple, cost-effective strategies for harnessing winter sun and summer shade to improve comfort, conserve resources, and boost garden productivity. Topics will include seasonal sun paths, ideal tree and building orientation, passive solar design, optimizing roof overhangs, integrating wind and water strategies, solar cooking, solar rights, and retrofitting structures and landscapes for greater energy efficiency. Along the way, you’ll be inspired by the power of working with the elements rather than against them.

Santa Fe Livability Speaker Series, Session 3, with Brad Lancaster
2025-09-23 17:00 - 19:00
WHERE:
SITE Santa Fe, 1606 Paseo de Peralta, Santa Fe, NM 87501
More info to come, along with other events with Brad in Santa Fe Sept 22-24.
Join Brad Lancaster, author of Rainwater Harvesting for Drylands and Beyond and co-founder of NeighborhoodForesters.org, for an inspiring discussion on how simple, low-cost strategies can transform our homes, neighborhoods, and community into thriving oases of abundance. Brad will share practical ways to work with natural systems—harvesting rainwater, reusing greywater, growing shade, building fertile soil, and revitalizing public spaces—to create healthier, more resilient environments.
Through compelling real-world examples, you’ll see how hand-built structures have restored wetlands, how sun and shade are harnessed to power homes naturally, and how stormwater can be redirected to grow beauty, food, and community. Brad will highlight how these regenerative practices can shape local development and the land development code. By incentivizing green infrastructure and integrating water-harvesting landscapes into urban design, these approaches support long-term water security, climate resilience, and vibrant public spaces.
It’s more than a presentation—it’s a call to action and a practical roadmap to engage and partner with your natural surroundings and to further embed sustainability into the city’s growth and development. Come learn how to turn scarcity i

More info at the series at:
https://www.livabilityspeakerseries.com/

Water Harvesting Design Certification Course – Tucson, Arizona
2025-10-13 08:00 - 2025-10-18 17:00
For more info on this Watershed Management Group course, plus how to register see:
https://watershedmg.org/event/water-harvesting-design-certification-october-2025
Brad will teach October 13 or 1 4, and he will also offer a guided tour of his place and some of his neighborhood’s rain-irrigated native food forest work, Sunday October 19th.
Sign up for the tour once it is posted on Brad’s Events page.

Guided Water-Harvesting Home & Neighborhood Block Tour with Brad Lancaster – Tucson, AZ
2025-10-19 08:00 - 10:00
WHEN: 8am – 10am, Sunday, October 19, 2025
WHERE: 813 N. 9th Avenue, Tucson, AZ 85705
COST: $15 per person. Must pay/register in advance. No-shows cannot be refunded.
Limited number of spaces. First paid, first served.

$15.00
Buy now

Come tour with the guy who wrote the books on water harvesting and more!
Brad Lancaster, author of the just released, full-color, revised editions of his award-winning books “Rainwater Harvesting for Drylands and Beyond, Volumes 1 and 2” will guide this tour of he and his brother’s family’s water-harvesting & landscape design award-winning 1/8th-acre urban property and surrounding block of the neighborhood.
100,000 gallons of rain and stormwater is harvested annually on the property and in the adjoining public right-of-way. You’ll see examples of:
• an integrated “tiny house” where a one-car garage was converted into a cottage or “garottage” that passive heats and cools itself for free with well-designed winter sun access & summer shading. 75% of its building materials were salvaged from the waste stream;
• solar cooking, solar water heating, and solar power;
• legal & inexpensive site-built composting toilets, which helped legalize such toilets state-wide;
• organic gardens getting 95+% of their irrigation needs met by harvested rainwater;
• inexpensive gravity-fed rainwater harvesting systems providing safe & delicious rainwater for all domestic needs including drinking – with no expensive pumps or mechanical filtration systems;
• extensive gravity-fed greywater harvesting systems turning “waste” waters into resource waters.
• how a joyous 20 plus-years of car-free life has been possible (cargo bicycle is key), and saves over $8,000 annually
In the neighborhood part of the tour you’ll see:
• water-harvesting traffic-calming features that helped turn a dangerous streets into welcoming bicycle boulevards,
• street-runoff harvesting strategies that use street runoff to freely irrigate street trees and control flooding – and new evolutions and improvements on these strategies
• learn how these once “pre-legal” street runoff-harvesting strategies were legalized, rebated, and mandated
• native food forests doubling as wildlife and pollinator corridors that canopy over public foot paths,
• how an annual neighborhood rain and tree planting effort has resulted in the planting of over 1,500 trees and hundreds of understory plants in the neighborhood
• how a county grant helped pay for water-harvesting strategies harvesting over 1 million gallons of annual stormwater in and along the streets
• how a neighborhood-organized Neighborhood Foresters program is training up the neighborhood to steward these features and is implementing more.
• public art & other strategies reclaiming the commons for more life!

Brad will also be selling (at deep discount) & signing copies of
• the newly released & revised, full-color editions of his award-winning books
• the new SPANISH EDITION of his book Cosecha de agua de lluvia para zonas áridas y más allá
• Plant the Rain t-shirts, caps, and stickers
• Siembra la lluvia caps and stickers

For self-guided water tours in Tucson see:
https://www.harvestingrainwater.com/tour/

Here is a video of a 2016 tour of my place (more evolutions have since occurred)…

Water Harvesting Design Certification Course – Tucson, Arizona
2025-11-03 08:00 - 2025-11-08 17:00
For more info on this Watershed Management Group course, plus how to register see:
https://watershedmg.org/event/water-harvesting-design-certification-november-2025

Brad will teach November 3 or 4, and he will also offer a guided tour of his place and some of his neighborhood’s rain-irrigated native food forest work, Sunday November 9th.
Sign up for the tour once it is posted on Brad’s Events page.

Guided Water-Harvesting Home & Neighborhood Block Tour with Brad Lancaster – Tucson, AZ
2025-11-09 09:00 - 11:00
WHEN: 9am – 11am, Sunday, November 9, 2025
WHERE: 813 N. 9th Avenue, Tucson, AZ 85705
COST: $15 per person. Must pay/register in advance. No-shows cannot be refunded.
Limited number of spaces. First paid, first served.

$15.00
Buy now

Come tour with the guy who wrote the books on water harvesting and more!
Brad Lancaster, author of the just released, full-color, revised editions of his award-winning books “Rainwater Harvesting for Drylands and Beyond, Volumes 1 and 2” will guide this tour of he and his brother’s family’s water-harvesting & landscape design award-winning 1/8th-acre urban property and surrounding block of the neighborhood.
100,000 gallons of rain and stormwater is harvested annually on the property and in the adjoining public right-of-way. You’ll see examples of:
• an integrated “tiny house” where a one-car garage was converted into a cottage or “garottage” that passive heats and cools itself for free with well-designed winter sun access & summer shading. 75% of its building materials were salvaged from the waste stream;
• solar cooking, solar water heating, and solar power;
• legal & inexpensive site-built composting toilets, which helped legalize such toilets state-wide;
• organic gardens getting 95+% of their irrigation needs met by harvested rainwater;
• inexpensive gravity-fed rainwater harvesting systems providing safe & delicious rainwater for all domestic needs including drinking – with no expensive pumps or mechanical filtration systems;
• extensive gravity-fed greywater harvesting systems turning “waste” waters into resource waters.
• how a joyous 20 plus-years of car-free life has been possible (cargo bicycle is key), and saves over $8,000 annually
In the neighborhood part of the tour you’ll see:
• water-harvesting traffic-calming features that helped turn a dangerous streets into welcoming bicycle boulevards,
• street-runoff harvesting strategies that use street runoff to freely irrigate street trees and control flooding – and new evolutions and improvements on these strategies
• learn how these once “pre-legal” street runoff-harvesting strategies were legalized, rebated, and mandated
• native food forests doubling as wildlife and pollinator corridors that canopy over public foot paths,
• how an annual neighborhood rain and tree planting effort has resulted in the planting of over 1,500 trees and hundreds of understory plants in the neighborhood
• how a county grant helped pay for water-harvesting strategies harvesting over 1 million gallons of annual stormwater in and along the streets
• how a neighborhood-organized Neighborhood Foresters program is training up the neighborhood to steward these features and is implementing more.
• public art & other strategies reclaiming the commons for more life!

Brad will also be selling (at deep discount) & signing copies of
• the newly released & revised, full-color editions of his award-winning books
• the new SPANISH EDITION of his book Cosecha de agua de lluvia para zonas áridas y más allá
• Plant the Rain t-shirts, caps, and stickers
• Siembra la lluvia caps and stickers

For self-guided water tours in Tucson see:
https://www.harvestingrainwater.com/tour/

Here is a video of a 2016 tour of my place (more evolutions have since occurred)…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KcAMXm9zITg&t=15s

Water Harvesting Design Certification Course – Tucson, Arizona
2026-03-02 - 2026-03-14 | watershed management group
For more info on this Watershed Management Group course, plus how to register see:
https://watershedmg.org/events/water-harvesting-design-certification-march-2026

Brad will teach March 9, and he will also offer a guided tour of his place and some of his neighborhood’s rain-irrigated native food forest work, Sunday March 15th.
Sign up for the tour once it is posted on Brad’s Events page.

Guided Water-Harvesting Home & Neighborhood Block Tour with Brad Lancaster – Tucson, AZ
2026-03-15 08:00 - 10:00
WHEN: 8am – 10am, Sunday, March 15, 2026
WHERE: 813 N. 9th Avenue, Tucson, AZ 85705
COST: $15 per person. Must pay/register in advance. No-shows cannot be refunded.
Limited number of spaces. First paid, first served.

$15.00
Buy now

Come tour with the guy who wrote the books on water harvesting and more!
Brad Lancaster, author of the just released, full-color, revised editions of his award-winning books “Rainwater Harvesting for Drylands and Beyond, Volumes 1 and 2” will guide this tour of he and his brother’s family’s water-harvesting & landscape design award-winning 1/8th-acre urban property and surrounding block of the neighborhood.
100,000 gallons of rain and stormwater is harvested annually on the property and in the adjoining public right-of-way. You’ll see examples of:
• an integrated “tiny house” where a one-car garage was converted into a cottage or “garottage” that passive heats and cools itself for free with well-designed winter sun access & summer shading. 75% of its building materials were salvaged from the waste stream;
• solar cooking, solar water heating, and solar power;
• legal & inexpensive site-built composting toilets, which helped legalize such toilets state-wide;
• organic gardens getting 95+% of their irrigation needs met by harvested rainwater;
• inexpensive gravity-fed rainwater harvesting systems providing safe & delicious rainwater for all domestic needs including drinking – with no expensive pumps or mechanical filtration systems;
• extensive gravity-fed greywater harvesting systems turning “waste” waters into resource waters.
• how a joyous 20 plus-years of car-free life has been possible (cargo bicycle is key), and saves over $8,000 annually
In the neighborhood part of the tour you’ll see:
• water-harvesting traffic-calming features that helped turn a dangerous streets into welcoming bicycle boulevards,
• street-runoff harvesting strategies that use street runoff to freely irrigate street trees and control flooding – and new evolutions and improvements on these strategies
• learn how these once “pre-legal” street runoff-harvesting strategies were legalized, rebated, and mandated
• native food forests doubling as wildlife and pollinator corridors that canopy over public foot paths,
• how an annual neighborhood rain and tree planting effort has resulted in the planting of over 1,800 trees and thousands of understory plants in the neighborhood
• how a county grant helped pay for water-harvesting strategies harvesting over 1 million gallons of annual stormwater in and along the streets
• how a neighborhood-organized Neighborhood Foresters program is training up the neighborhood to steward these features and is implementing more.
• public art & other strategies reclaiming the commons for more life!

Brad will also be selling (at deep discount) & signing copies of
• the newly released & revised, full-color editions of his award-winning books
• the new SPANISH EDITION of his book Cosecha de agua de lluvia para zonas áridas y más allá
• Plant the Rain t-shirts, caps, and stickers
• Siembra la lluvia caps and stickers

For self-guided water tours in Tucson see:
https://www.harvestingrainwater.com/tour/

Here is a video of a 2016 tour of my place (more evolutions have since occurred)…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KcAMXm9zITg&t=15s

7th annual community planting of new street-side, water-harvesting basins in the public rights-of-ways of the West University neighborhood – Tucson, AZ
2026-03-28 06:00 - 10:00
WHEN: 6am – 10am, Saturday, March 28, 2026
WHERE: 848 N. 3rd Avenue,
Depending on how many folks show up, and how quick we plant, we may also continue to plant basins at 1007 N. 3rd Ave – (you’ll see us on 1st Street just west of 3rd Ave).

Come help us plant seven new street-side, water-harvesting, eddy basins — installations in the public commons, planted and stewarded by the participating public.
We plant the rain before we plant the plants!
This planting of rain, trees, understory, & wildflowers is occurring in the West University neighborhood (which is within the same watershed as the Dunbar/Spring neighborhood – so we are all part of the same larger and interconnected waterhood),
but the planting event is open to anyone from any neighborhood, and is a great opportunity to see how such an event, or other Neighborhood Forester endeavors, could be organized elsewhere.
NOTE: there will be a film crew documenting the planting

We’ll start with a brief planting demonstration led by Brad Lancaster then plant. The demonstration will show you how to plant the rain to maximize its potential, how to plant food-bearing native trees by seed and/or with nursery stock to maximize passive summer shading/cooling, and how to recycle/plant prunings and leaves as fertility-building, carbon-sequestering, pollutant-filtering, water-harvesting mulch.
End time of ten is approximate (with a good showing of folks we’ll likely finish up early).
Cost: FREE—plus your planting help
Come join us in planting native shade trees, understory vegetation, wildflowers, and seed within or beside water-harvesting earthworks in the public rights-of-way. The idea is to plant native food-producing, flood-controlling, wildlife-habitat-producing, beautiful, air- and water-filtering, living air conditioners.
Street trees that shade up to 75% of the street’s surface can also cool summer neighborhood temperatures by up to 20ºF.
This enhances the walkability and bikeability of our neighborhoods, which improves health and drops crime. When we harvest street runoff to irrigate the street trees, we reduce water consumption as we reduce downstream flooding we naturally bioremediate/filter pollutants, and help indirectly and directly recharge our groundwater. Thus far this annual event has resulted in over 1,800 trees being planted in our neighborhood/waterhood, thousands of understory plants, and contributed to annually harvesting over one and a quarter million gallons of stormwater that used to go to the stormdrain—let’s keep going!
Thanks to Little John Excavating for doing the basin excavation, Churchman Sand & Gravel for catalina granite rock, Dunbar/Spring Neighborhood Foresters for the mesquite branches, and Dryland Design for doing the excellent rockwork and logwork.

What to bring: Work clothes, sun hat, gloves, and water as we’ll be working outdoors. A pointed shovel, pruning tools, and/or hard rake would also be great (and we’ll have some extra tools on hand for those lacking them).

NEXT PLANTING
Three additional street-side basins on 1st Street are being completed now. Once done we’ll schedule a community planting for them – so check back for date and details.

For info and photos from past plantings see here

For more info on our Annual Neighborhood Rain, Tree, & Food Forest Planting see here

For more info & photos on the plants we plant see here

For more info on these and many other water harvesting strategies, check out the full-color, revised editions of Rainwater Harvesting for Drylands and Beyond available at deep discount direct from the author Brad Lancaster.

7th annual community planting of new street-side, water-harvesting basins PART 2 in the public rights-of-ways of the West University neighborhood – Tucson, AZ
2026-04-11 06:30 - 10:00
WHEN: 6:30am – 10am, Saturday, April 11, 2026
WHERE: 437 E. 1st Street,
When we finish planting the two basins at that site we’ll plant the last basin at 502 E. 2nd Street

Come help us plant three new street-side, water-harvesting, eddy basins — installations in the public commons, planted and stewarded by the participating public.
We plant the rain before we plant the plants!
This planting of rain, trees, understory, & wildflowers is occurring in the West University neighborhood (which is within the same watershed as the Dunbar/Spring neighborhood – so we are all part of the same larger and interconnected waterhood),
but the planting event is open to anyone from any neighborhood, and is a great opportunity to see how such an event, or other Neighborhood Forester endeavors, could be organized elsewhere.
NOTE: there may be a film crew documenting the planting

We’ll start with a brief planting demonstration led by Brad Lancaster then plant. The demonstration will show you how to plant the rain to maximize its potential, how to plant food-bearing native trees by seed and/or with nursery stock to maximize passive summer shading/cooling, and how to recycle/plant prunings and leaves as fertility-building, carbon-sequestering, pollutant-filtering, water-harvesting mulch.
End time of ten is approximate (with a good showing of folks we’ll likely finish up early as we did at the last planting).
Cost: FREE—plus your planting help
Come join us in planting native shade trees, understory vegetation, wildflowers, and seed within or beside water-harvesting earthworks in the public rights-of-way. The idea is to plant native food-producing, flood-controlling, wildlife-habitat-producing, beautiful, air- and water-filtering, living air conditioners.
Street trees that shade up to 75% of the street’s surface can also cool summer neighborhood temperatures by up to 20ºF.
This enhances the walkability and bikeability of our neighborhoods, which improves health and drops crime. When we harvest street runoff to irrigate the street trees, we reduce water consumption as we reduce downstream flooding we naturally bioremediate/filter pollutants, and help indirectly and directly recharge our groundwater. Thus far this annual event has resulted in over 1,800 trees being planted in our neighborhood/waterhood, thousands of understory plants, and contributed to annually harvesting over one and a quarter million gallons of stormwater that used to go to the stormdrain—let’s keep going!
Thanks to Little John Excavating for doing the basin excavation, Churchman Sand & Gravel for catalina granite rock, Dunbar/Spring Neighborhood Foresters for the mesquite branches, and Dryland Design for doing the excellent rockwork and logwork.

What to bring: Work clothes, sun hat, gloves, and water as we’ll be working outdoors. A pointed shovel, pruning tools, and/or hard rake would also be great (and we’ll have some extra tools on hand for those lacking them).

Celebración del DÍA DE LA TIERRA, Huerto Roma Verde, Mexico City, Mexico
2026-04-22 14:00 - 16:00 | Jalapa 234, Centro Urbano Pdte. Juárez, Roma Sur, Alc. Cuauhtémoc, 06760 Ciudad de México
Celebración del DÍA DE LA TIERRA, tour, and discussions at HUERTO ROMA VERDE – an urban garden

Open to public.

HUERTO ROMA VERDE
Jalapa 234, Centro Urbano Pdte. Juárez, Roma Sur,
Alc. Cuauhtémoc, 06760 Ciudad de México

Book release, signing, & presentation at UNAM - National Autonomous University of Mexico in Mexico City, Mexico
2026-04-23 11:00 - 12:30
Brad Lancaster, author of “Cosecha de agua de lluvia para zonas áridas y más allá“; and distinguished panelists including Rosa Morales, Directora, YZ Proyecdtos de Dearrollo A.C.; Mtra. Flavia Tudela Rivadeneyra, Coordinadora del Colegio de Geografía, Facultad de Filosofía y Letras UNAM; Mtro. Eduardo Vázquez, Director General, Agua Capital; Mtro. Jorge Alberto Arriaga Medina, Coordinador Ejectivo, Red del Agua UNAM; Mtro. Delfín Montañana, Director de Educación Socioambiental y Sensibilización, Isla Urbana; Lic. Jennifer White, Directora General, Isla Urbana will speak at the book release, which will be followed by a book sales and signings with Brad Lancaster.

This event will be recorded.

Re-hydrating and Re-enlivening Our Communities with Neighborhood Rain-watered Native Food Forestry - virtual presentation
2026-05-10 12:30 - 14:00 | Global Earth Repair Convergence
Re-hydrating and Re-enlivening Our Communities with Rain-watered Neighborhood Food Forestry

This presentation is about neighborhood forestry efforts empowering citizens, contractors, & policy makers to effectively plant the rain and native food-bearing vegetation to grow vibrant and resilient abundance where they live, work, and play. Then train them up and support them with the education, guidance, collaborations, and policy that enable them to better steward the plantings for decades to come. Dramatic results include cooler neighborhoods, healthier eating, a revitalization of indigenous cuisine, deeper connections with people and place, reduced flooding, skill building, greater soil fertility, and more beauty and joy. The strategies and practices are accessible to all and most are free or cost no more than the price of a shovel.

Get more info & register at:
https://www.globalearthrepairconvergence.com/

Sustainable Urban Landscape Conference - Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
2026-06-26 - 2026-06-27 | Metro Tech Springlake Campus, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
Brad Lancaster will give two keynote presentations at this event.
More information at:
https://www.okcbeautiful.com/sustainable-urban-landscape-conference

More Life Less Lawn - virtual event
2026-06-30
Brad will give the following virtual presentation for this multi-month Less Lawn More Life program…
Turning Drains Into Sponges and Water Scarcity Into Water Abundance
This inspiring presentation shares eight universal principles of water harvesting along with simple strategies that turn water scarcity into water abundance, and floods into opportunity. They empower you to create integrated water-sustainable landscape plans at home and throughout your community. Rainwater harvesting is the process of capturing rain and making the most of it as close as possible to where it falls. Greywater harvesting is the process of directing water from household sink, bathtub, shower, and washing-machine drains into the soils of the landscape where the water is naturally filtered and reused to generate more on-site resources. The two work hand in hand, and can reduce our water consumption by 30 to 70%! You’ll see examples enhancing local food security, passively cooling cities in summer, reducing costs of living and energy consumption, controlling erosion, averting flooding, reviving dead waterways, minimizing water pollution, building community, creating celebration, and more.
(Duration: 40 minutes plus Q&A)

For more on the multi-month event/program see:
https://www.lesslawnmorelife.com/

For more on Brad’s webinar see:
https://www.joinwildr.com/events/llml-rainwater

Water Harvesting Design Certification Course – Tucson, Arizona
2026-10-05 - 2026-10-17
For more info on this Watershed Management Group course, plus how to register see:
https://watershedmg.org/events/water-harvesting-design-certification-october-2026

Brad will teach October 12, and he will also offer a guided tour of his place and some of his neighborhood’s rain-irrigated native food forest work, Sunday October 18th.
Sign up for the tour here.

Guided Water-Harvesting Home & Neighborhood Block Tour with Brad Lancaster – Tucson, AZ
2026-10-18 08:00 - 10:00
WHEN: 8am – 10am, Sunday, October 18, 2026
WHERE: 813 N. 9th Avenue, Tucson, AZ 85705
COST: $15 per person. Must pay/register in advance. No-shows cannot be refunded.
Limited number of spaces. First paid, first served.

I will post a BUY BUTTON here about a month before the event

Come tour with the guy who wrote the books on water harvesting and more!
Brad Lancaster, author of the just released, full-color, revised editions of his award-winning books “Rainwater Harvesting for Drylands and Beyond, Volumes 1 and 2” will guide this tour of he and his brother’s family’s water-harvesting & landscape design award-winning 1/8th-acre urban property and surrounding block of the neighborhood.
100,000 gallons of rain and stormwater is harvested annually on the property and in the adjoining public right-of-way. You’ll see examples of:
• an integrated “tiny house” where a one-car garage was converted into a cottage or “garottage” that passive heats and cools itself for free with well-designed winter sun access & summer shading. 75% of its building materials were salvaged from the waste stream;
• solar cooking, solar water heating, and solar power;
• legal & inexpensive site-built composting toilets, which helped legalize such toilets state-wide;
• organic gardens getting 95+% of their irrigation needs met by harvested rainwater;
• inexpensive gravity-fed rainwater harvesting systems providing safe & delicious rainwater for all domestic needs including drinking – with no expensive pumps or mechanical filtration systems;
• extensive gravity-fed greywater harvesting systems turning “waste” waters into resource waters.
• how a joyous 20 plus-years of car-free life has been possible (cargo bicycle is key), and saves over $8,000 annually
In the neighborhood part of the tour you’ll see:
• water-harvesting traffic-calming features that helped turn a dangerous streets into welcoming bicycle boulevards,
• street-runoff harvesting strategies that use street runoff to freely irrigate street trees and control flooding – and new evolutions and improvements on these strategies
• learn how these once “pre-legal” street runoff-harvesting strategies were legalized, rebated, and mandated
• native food forests doubling as wildlife and pollinator corridors that canopy over public foot paths,
• how an annual neighborhood rain and tree planting effort has resulted in the planting of over 1,800 trees and thousands of understory plants in the neighborhood
• how a county grant helped pay for water-harvesting strategies harvesting over 1 million gallons of annual stormwater in and along the streets
• how a neighborhood-organized Neighborhood Foresters program is training up the neighborhood to steward these features and is implementing more.
• public art & other strategies reclaiming the commons for more life!

Brad will also be selling (at deep discount) & signing copies of
• the newly released & revised, full-color editions of his award-winning books
• the new SPANISH EDITION of his book Cosecha de agua de lluvia para zonas áridas y más allá
• Plant the Rain t-shirts, caps, and stickers
• Siembra la lluvia caps and stickers

For self-guided water tours in Tucson see:
https://www.harvestingrainwater.com/tour/

Here is a video of a 2016 tour of my place (more evolutions have since occurred)…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KcAMXm9zITg&t=15s

Water Harvesting Design Certification Course – Tucson, Arizona
2026-11-09 - 2026-11-21
For more info on this Watershed Management Group course, plus how to register see:
https://watershedmg.org/events/water-harvesting-design-certification-november-2026

Brad will teach November 16, and he will also offer a guided tour of his place and some of his neighborhood’s rain-irrigated native food forest work, Sunday October 18th.
Sign up for the tour here.

Guided Water-Harvesting Home & Neighborhood Block Tour with Brad Lancaster – Tucson, AZ
2026-11-22 08:00 - 10:00
WHEN: 8am – 10am, Sunday, November 22, 2026
WHERE: 813 N. 9th Avenue, Tucson, AZ 85705
COST: $15 per person. Must pay/register in advance. No-shows cannot be refunded.
Limited number of spaces. First paid, first served.

I will post a BUY BUTTON here about a month before the event

Come tour with the guy who wrote the books on water harvesting and more!
Brad Lancaster, author of the just released, full-color, revised editions of his award-winning books “Rainwater Harvesting for Drylands and Beyond, Volumes 1 and 2” will guide this tour of he and his brother’s family’s water-harvesting & landscape design award-winning 1/8th-acre urban property and surrounding block of the neighborhood.
100,000 gallons of rain and stormwater is harvested annually on the property and in the adjoining public right-of-way. You’ll see examples of:
• an integrated “tiny house” where a one-car garage was converted into a cottage or “garottage” that passive heats and cools itself for free with well-designed winter sun access & summer shading. 75% of its building materials were salvaged from the waste stream;
• solar cooking, solar water heating, and solar power;
• legal & inexpensive site-built composting toilets, which helped legalize such toilets state-wide;
• organic gardens getting 95+% of their irrigation needs met by harvested rainwater;
• inexpensive gravity-fed rainwater harvesting systems providing safe & delicious rainwater for all domestic needs including drinking – with no expensive pumps or mechanical filtration systems;
• extensive gravity-fed greywater harvesting systems turning “waste” waters into resource waters.
• how a joyous 20 plus-years of car-free life has been possible (cargo bicycle is key), and saves over $8,000 annually
In the neighborhood part of the tour you’ll see:
• water-harvesting traffic-calming features that helped turn a dangerous streets into welcoming bicycle boulevards,
• street-runoff harvesting strategies that use street runoff to freely irrigate street trees and control flooding – and new evolutions and improvements on these strategies
• learn how these once “pre-legal” street runoff-harvesting strategies were legalized, rebated, and mandated
• native food forests doubling as wildlife and pollinator corridors that canopy over public foot paths,
• how an annual neighborhood rain and tree planting effort has resulted in the planting of over 1,800 trees and thousands of understory plants in the neighborhood
• how a county grant helped pay for water-harvesting strategies harvesting over 1 million gallons of annual stormwater in and along the streets
• how a neighborhood-organized Neighborhood Foresters program is training up the neighborhood to steward these features and is implementing more.
• public art & other strategies reclaiming the commons for more life!

Brad will also be selling (at deep discount) & signing copies of
• the newly released & revised, full-color editions of his award-winning books
• the new SPANISH EDITION of his book Cosecha de agua de lluvia para zonas áridas y más allá
• Plant the Rain t-shirts, caps, and stickers
• Siembra la lluvia caps and stickers

For self-guided water tours in Tucson see:
https://www.harvestingrainwater.com/tour/

Here is a video of a 2016 tour of my place (more evolutions have since occurred)…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KcAMXm9zITg&t=15s
