Key Points
Watering with a hose conserves water by letting you control flow and avoid runoff.
Slow, targeted watering at the plant base helps roots absorb water and reduces waste.
Proper timing and technique prevent evaporation, overwatering, and plant stress.
Watering a garden or yard certainly isn’t cheap, especially if you live in a drought-prone region. But luckily, there’s no need to invest in a fancy, high-tech watering system to conserve water. According to Richard Restuccia, author of Waterwise Gardening, the hose you probably already own is the perfect tool.
“Hand watering with a garden hose is one of the most efficient ways to water,” he says. “This is because you can see exactly when the soil can’t take any more water and starts to run off.”
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But technique does matter. Here, Restuccia and two other sustainable gardening experts weigh in on how to water your plants with a garden hose without wasting a ton of water in the process.
Meet the Experts
Richard Restuccia is the author of Waterwise Gardening: Everything You Need to Know About Efficient Watering to Grow a Healthy Yard. This book offers scientific guidance on conserving water while still cultivating a bountiful garden.
Brooke Addison is a sustainable landscape designer and owner of Lark Haven Studio. She is also a certified water harvesting practitioner through Watershed Management Group in Tucson, Arizona.
Noelle Johnson is a horticulturist and the author of The Water-Smart Garden and Dry Climate Gardening. She offers educational resources for gardening in hot and dry climates.
Employ the Slow Trickle Method
According to Noelle Johnson, author of The Water-Smart Garden, many people begin wasting water with their hose the moment they twist the spigot handle.
“Don’t turn on the hose full blast when watering plants,” she says. “In many cases, water runs off before it has a chance to permeate the soil. Instead, turn it into a slow trickle and allow it to permeate the soil slowly, which will allow it to reach the root zone of plants and promote deep rooting.”
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To use this watering method, simply place the end of your garden hose on the ground of your garden bed. It can take an hour or longer to adequately water your plants this way, so don’t forget to set a timer to remind yourself to turn off your hose. On the plus side, you won’t need to water your garden as often when you use this technique.
Focus on the Root of the Plant
Credit: Iryna Khabliuk / Getty Images
Brooke Addison is a sustainable landscape designer, and she notes that where you position your hose makes a huge difference in reducing water waste when watering your plants by hand with a hose.
“Focus your hose around the base of your plant,” she says. “We want to get water to the roots, not drench the entire plant. We also don’t want to disperse water into the air where it will just evaporate (that is one of the reasons I don’t like sprinklers!).”
Water Early in the Morning
The time of day you water your plants also affects how much water you’ll need to release from your hose to ensure they’re actually taking in enough water.
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“You want to avoid watering in the midday when it’s hottest,” Addison says. “You lose more water to evaporation, and you risk burning your plant leaves.”
She notes that morning is the optimal time for watering. Your plants will have the entire day to dry off. Unfortunately, night watering creates the perfect conditions for slugs and pathogens to thrive.
Water Less on Overcast and Cool Days
Restuccia says it’s important to keep in mind that the length of time you’ll need to run your hose will be longer on hot, sunny, and windy days than on cool and overcast days.
“Evapotranspiration (ET) is how much water your plants use and how much water evaporates from the soil,” he says. “When the ET is high due to hot temperatures or wind, your garden needs more frequent water, and when it’s overcast and cool, it needs less.”
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He says that in the summertime, it’s not unusual for ET to exceed 1 inch per week. This means to have healthy plants, you have to return that much water to the soil through rain or watering.
Learn How Much Water Your Hose Releases Per Minute
Credit: HappyNati / Getty Images
If you don’t know how long it takes your hose to deliver a gallon of water to each of your plants, Restuccia says the chances of overwatering them are high. Most garden hoses are 5/8 inch in diameter, which he says releases anywhere from 9 to 17 gallons per minute.
“The amount of water it flows depends on how wide you open the valve and how much pressure you apply,” he says. That is why I always recommend turning your garden hose on (to the point where you usually turn the handle), letting it flow into a one-gallon bucket, and counting to see how long it takes to fill the bucket.”
Read the original article on The Spruce
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