How Do You Water A Big Garden?

[so lucky]

I just bought two more soaker hoses to put, and leave, in my garden. I like the way they work, and you can get some snap-on hose connectors to put on the soaker and on your house-hose, so you are not out there screwing and twisting and messing up the lay-out every time you need to water. Are you thinking about permanent rows and paths? Since space is not a problem now, you can do what seems more convenient for you. I guess you will need to fence the garden?
Love your new toy!
You are going to need to have a compost party to help get your garden in shape. Invite all of us on the forum, and have each of us bring a big bag of compost or manure. And you can feed us some Texas barbeque and take us for rides on the Kubota.

 

[Jeni Ann]

Very clever! I knew Hubby would find a better way than lugging those 5 gallon buckets!!

 

[baymule]

@so lucky I am thinking of a yoke of fittings to attach soaker hoses to, so I can lay them in the rows. When the plants are done, I can roll up the hoses. From what I have been reading, the drip tape doesn't last but a season or two, the soaker hoses seem to last longer. Anybody know the life span of these things?

 

[thistlebloom]

The life span of soakers depends on a lot of things. If they are covered with mulch so the sun doesn't degrade them they can last years. I have one in a perennial bed that's at least 3 years old. But you can probably get several more years than that out of them.

Just keep in mind that they won't be as effective if you string more than 2 lengths together. In fact I think mine work best when I just use a single length. They lose water pressure if they have too much length.

I like soakers, and I decided this year, that that's how I want to water everything next year. I water an awful lot of weeds now.
It will be a big expense for me up front, but will pay off in my frustration level when I no longer see all those healthy weeds that I don''t have time to pull.

 

[Jared77]

Bay I think you're putting the cart in front of the horse......errr the kubota in front of the disk

What I would do is seriously plan out what you need/want/will consume in a season. Sure you may have acreage but if your not feeding the entire 82nd Airborne division you don't need to plant a garden big enough to feed the 82nd Airborne just because you have the space and tools to do it.

Unless your planning on doing a business model then that's a tractor of another color

So given that you didn't mention going that route you really should take a step back and look at what your consuming. How much do you need? How much are you going to preserve and store? How much could you realistically store?

Things like this should be considered so your not creating work yet unable to reap the benefits of all that work.

I'd do a "field rotation" and having at least one garden planted with a cover crop for that year following growing year. Then you turn your poultry (layers, ducks, meat birds, turkey) on it or till it under to help rebuild the soil quality. Or even raise rabbits and turn them out in tractors onto it.

(Lot of tractor talk in 1 thread.....*groan*)

As far as which ones and when that's on your local ag dept. Between a cover crop, and manure/compost you should have done amazing gardens.

I'd also do a series of mulch buried soaker hoses with a multi connection splitter and hook my water up to that. It may mean doing a couple of connections and watering in sections but to me it would be the most effective use of water & most maintainable set up I can think of.

I'd plan my gardens at 2 soaker hose lengths so they are still efficient, but you could do as many rows as you wanted.

I'd keep them close together so my portable water as Carol & Seedcorn mentioned would be easy to move over or maybe trench a water line and spigot out to that area and go from there.

Just my humble thoughts. Regardless you've got a great problem on your hands.

 

[Carol Dee]

Warning FOUR 25 foot rows of green beans is TOO MUCH!

 

[bobm]

Bay, here is another water and labor saving tip for you if you are to plant fruit or ornamental trees / shrubs / bushes ( berry)/ flower or garden beds. What I did that works wonders for the past 20 years ( I planted 100 trees on 2 1/2 acres for grounds around the house) is first dig a trench about a foot to two ft. deep to bury a 3/4" pvc sprinkler line with risers ( I also installed individual water volume flow control valves at this point to account for different water needs of the plants at each planting site) at every tree that you plant and attach to length 1/8" diameter length as needed and attach a drip attachment head to it. Attach to automatic sprinkler control valves with timers at the water source. I split the lines into 4 sections, each with it's own control valve. Next, buy 10' long perforated white rigit sewer line pipe. Cut them into thirds and you get 3 40" long pipe. Next, get a 12" wide auger to run off your PTO and drill 3 40" deep holes side by side (into a triangle- 3 ft. diameter). These holes can be at least 1 + ft. to any distance that you want away as you choose from the PVC line ( farther away the better to savve the line in case the tree should fall over and the roots damage the PVC water line as the tree falls over). Place one of the 40" long sections of pipe into the holes so that the tops are 2" - 3" above ground level with the bottom at about 38" below ground and back fill with dirt thoroughly mixed with compost, manure, etc.. Place the drip about 12" to 18" down the sewer line pipe. Place a small rock over the top of the sewer line hole to keep small critters from falling in as well as dirt or other debris from falling in. Let the water drip into the sewer line pipe for a day to soak and settle the soil well, then let dry for a day or two , then plant your trees. This will save a lot of water and labor and force the tree roots to grow deep which will in turn help in periods of drought as well as anchoring the trees much better during strong wind storms.

 

[digitS']

A couple more things pique my interest (excitable, ain't I).

Adequate watering comes down to very nearly, 1 gallon/square foot. 1 gallon = 231 cubic inches. 1 square foot = 144 square inches. Okay, it is more like 1 gallon/ 1 1/3 square feet.

The garden extension last year more than doubled the size of my big veggie garden. The property owner was supposed to join me with each of us using 30' by 200' of the extension. He didn't plant all of his & harvested less. This year, there's nothing over there.

Generous person, he says I should take it all next year. Or, not. That would leave me with another 30' x 200'. Yeah, this extension was set up for 60' field sprinklers.

The "Or, not." Isn't going to work. He's putting in alfalfa next to it and irrigation for alfalfa isn't the same as for a garden. That thought will occur to him soon.

I'm gonna need to be very creative in dealing with this so that I don't have to take the full 60'! Or, I will have to take the full 60' x 200' and try to figure out what the heck to do with that!

One thing to do would be to grow green manure crops. I talked about this scheme before. I bet it would make a real improvement in the soil. The scheme could be

• field peas: sown April/tilled June;
• sunflowers: sown June/tilled July;
• field peas: sown July/tilled August;
• sunflowers: sown August/tilled April.

Tell me I wouldn't have some soil fertility after 12 months of that !

Steve

 

[baymule]

Warning FOUR 25 foot rows of green beans is TOO MUCH!

12' of the long Asian beans I grow is too much too! I usually can't wait for a killing frost!

 

[baymule]

LOTS of great ideas here! @Jared77 and @thistlebloom I am going to try not to overload myself, just because I can. I have been on this tiny city lot for so long, that at least I would like to plant a whole seed packet! How long is a soaker hose and what diameter?

@bobm you sure know what you're talking about, living where water is very dear and costly. I like your ideas. I want fruit/nut trees, berries, grapes, permanent plantings--and I don't want to hand water everything or drag water hoses and sprinklers.

I might not get to this the first garden season. If I don't, then the garden will be more modest in size. I definitely plan on more than one garden space and using green manures and taking advantage of my animals help. In my tiny garden, I have had to pull up plants that weren't all the way finished yet, so I could plant the next season's plants. I want to be able to rotate gardens, so the greens/broccoli/cauliflower/cabbage/etc can finish out while I plant the spring/summer in another location.