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The short version of the video: fit a water butt now, not once the rain has already started. Autumn brings noticeably more of it than summer, and a butt fitted in November catches none of what falls before it.
Before you buy anything
Check whether your water company offers a subsidised butt first. A number of UK suppliers run schemes, availability usually depends on your postcode, and some council schemes exist alongside them. Worth five minutes before paying full retail price below.
Sizing it
A 100 litre slimline kit
The default for most gardens
A solid default for an average UK garden and roof area. The kit this page is built around comes with everything needed to get it working, not just the barrel:
- A diverter that fits into the downpipe without cutting anything else away — the downpipe still runs normally once the butt is full, or if it's ever taken off again.
- A tap at the base.
- A raised stand. Without one there's no gap to get a watering can under the tap.
Going large? A bigger garden, or more roof feeding one downpipe, empties a single butt fast. A linked double kit roughly doubles the capacity for not much more space against the wall — worth it if you're watering containers or a vegetable bed right through summer, not just topping up a couple of pots.
See the Harcostar double kit
Why now, not later
Autumn is the wetter season here. Averaged over 2015–2024, the Met Office's own UK seasonal rainfall series has autumn at 343mm against summer's 255mm — about a third more rain. September and October are exactly the weeks a butt fitted late will miss entirely.
Fitting one takes minutes once the kit is on site. The only real deadline is getting it installed before most of that rain has already fallen and gone down the drain instead.
Images on this page are stills from the video and are AI-generated; the presenter is not a real person. The UK seasonal rainfall comparison is from the Met Office's own published climate data. Gardening advice is general by nature — roof area, guttering and what you want the water for all change the right size. See how this channel works for how content is sourced and the terms it is published under.
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