F/U to rain barrels: Roofing material?

SuperGreen

I've wanted some rain barrels for a long time now (HOA can just deal with it), but DH tells me lots of roofing materials, like the standard asphalt shingles we have, are made of toxic materials so you can't use water that runs over them to feed your veggie garden.  That makes sense to me, those singles are *nasty*, but I've never heard this from anyone besides him so I haven't argued with him.  Has anyone heard this and if so, did you have your roofing material tested before installing the rain barrels or do you just not use your rainwater for edible plants?  TIA!

d-and-k

To be honest - i never thought about it.  :  A quick google leads to a lot of competing arguments.  I used it last year on my vegetables...I live in an industrial city though, and part of me thinks, 'How much worse is the rain coming off my roof compared to the rain itself?'

Jen&Joe06

Ditto pp. I bet there are worse things in the rain then in runoff from the roof. We use the water on our gardens and don't think it is a problem.

CollegeGrrl219

You're not drinking the water directly, so I think you're fine. Your veggies don't have to have tap water or filtered water! The veggies can filter it out themselves.

 I think your HOA is trying to scare you.

Pescalita

I have heard this, and from the amount of asphalt gunk that gathers at the downspouts, I think there's definitely stuff getting in it.

I have no idea how using the rain barrel water is going to work yet, but I figure we'll start out using it on ornamentals and if we have more, use it on the veggies early on. I've heard to stay away from rain barrel water right around harvest time, which makes sense.

Ms.MKBT

Yikes!  I never thought about this. We have only watered flower gardens with our rain water so far, but we intended on planting a small garden this year.  We also will probably put on a new roof this year, so this was good to hear for when we research materials.