GAINESVILLE — To add a rain garden at home relies on three basic elements: a nice slope, slow flowing water and native plants.

A rain garden itself cleans and stores water along with "creating a very local solution to a community problem," said Peter Gordon, executive director of Elachee Nature Center.

The idea behind the rain garden is to divert storm water from roads and streams into your own yard.

"One of the problems that we do have in Georgia is that when it does rain ... we have real problems with storm water," Gordon said. "The water that runs on our houses and our yards is looking for a place to go. Today’s pollution sometimes is a little more difficult to deal with because we don’t know where it is coming from and rain gardens can help control that."

In Maryland, Prince George’s County’s Department of Environmental Resources provided a more scientific answer to the reason behind a rain garden. The environmental department’s publication, "How Does Your Garden Grow" reported that rain gardens use the concept of bioretention, a water quality practice where plants and soils remove pollutants from storm water. The layers of soils are a natural filter for water that can be polluted, and a rain garden is a natural way of protecting water quality and providing a cleaner, healthier environment.

Now, just how do you get that water to your rain garden?

"You can build a French drain where your water goes right underneath the ground," Gordon said. "Or you can put the plastic pipe across the ground from a downspout off your house attached to a low area."

Billy Skaggs, Hall County extension agent, said any way to get the water to the garden is just fine.

"It doesn’t really matter as long as the water is somehow directed to your rain garden," he said. "That is really all that is important."

A rain garden can be any shape or size, but it will be wettest in the middle, Gordon said.

"So you put plants in that like to be a little bit wet or a lot wet, and you can buy or find certain species of plants for this and native species work best," he said.

There are three different zones you should have with your rain garden: a low, outer and middle zone.

The lowest is for plants that can handle standing water and various water levels, the outer is for plants that like drier soil and the middle is a little drier but also has plants that can respond to fluctuating water levels, according to "How Does Your Garden Grow."

At McMahan’s Nursery in Clermont, staff member Tiffanny Jones said there are plenty plants native to Georgia that would work well in a rain garden.

"We have plenty of native plants here, plenty of drought tolerant stuff for sunny and for shade," she said. "It is true the natives are tough; we sell about half and half of native and non-native. But if they are not native here they are maybe drought tolerant in Texas, Arkansas or New Mexico."

Jones suggested plants for sunny areas of your rain garden like milkweed, pond cypress and silphium connatum, which is also called the Virginia cup plant. And for shade, she suggested hydrangea, autumn bride (Heuchera villosa) or fothergilla, more commonly known as witchalder.

"The great thing about native plants is even if it doesn’t rain, they can withstand the drought too," Gordon said. "The garden also will attract native birds and insects to your yard."

Skaggs added that any plant that you would use to attract butterflies would be perfect for a rain garden.

"Most of what you consider butterfly-attracting plants, like swamp sunflower, joe pye weed, cardinal flower... any of the asters," he said. "As far as trees go, red maple, willow oak, river birch, magnolia. In terms of shrubs there are a number of really good shrubs for wet areas — there’s ink berry, clethra, beauty berry is a great one and wax myrtle."