Taylor Precision Products 5293501 Rain Gauge, Clear and Teal

Macht was er soll regen messen. Und bleibt bei frost heile.

This is the first freeze resistant rain gauge I have seen and it works great. It is sturdy, has no leakage, provides a standard appearance, and overall a great value for the money as you don't have to replace it each year after it freezes and breaks as have all my other rain gauges. You can install it nearly anywhere there is an adequately clear view to the sky and it will measure precisely. The printing and floating gauge inside is bright and easy to read.

I have bought 3 other rain gauges. The first one was glass. It would get dirty inside & was hard to clean because it had a narrow opening. It was also hard to see the water measurement unless you got close to it. The next two were a hard plastic. These were easy to see but they both yellowed in time and cracked. I have had this one for about a month. I was surprised when my husband included the removable ground stake when he mounted it on the fence. It makes sense though because it keeps it from moving when the clear bracket the stake has is attached to a nail. You can see it in the 2nd picture I posted. The things I like about this one are: 1. It’s silicone so it won’t break or yellow (I hope it won’t yellow in time!). 2. It’s very easy to see at a distance - big numbers and red ring that shows the water level. 3. It’s easy to attach to a fence - all you need is 2 nails for the brackets to sit on. 4. It’ll measure up to 7 inches of rain - the other I had only measured 6. The one thing you have to be careful with is where you pour out the water because the red ring falls out and you don’t want to lose it.

I really like this rain gauge (1) because it's soft and pliable and won't break if I forget to bring it indoors before a freezing night, (2) the numbers and incremental markings are large so they're easy to read from inside the house (albeit I do have to use my monocular to get closer), and the red floater makes it easy to distinguish what the level is as I'm trying to read it from inside the house using my monocular. My last rain gauge was hard plastic, and it worked beautifully, until one really cold night when the water collected earlier in the day froze and cracked it badly. I don't have to be concerned about that happening with this one. I think Taylor did a great job with this.

My previous rain gage was hard plastic and broke the very first time there was water left in the reservoir during a hard freeze. I purchased this silicone model and it worked as advertised, with only one minor flaw. The gauge reservoir remained intact, and regained its shape after freezing with water still left at about the 3-4 inch level. However, the mounting bracket that the gauge fits into is still hard plastic, so you can likely guess the result. It did not destroy the plastic bracket, but it did cause a vertical crack. It is still holding for now, but not sure if I will have to rig it the next time it freezes as it could very well break even more. But overall, still much better than the hard plastic gauges that are "one and done" if frozen with water still in them.