Water is the common need of every garden; many gardeners, however, don’t realize how much water their plants get in a normal week. It’s easy to forget how much water is being used between the rain, manual watering, automated sprinkler systems and more. If you have an outdoor garden, whether it is a landscape or a backyard vegetable patch, it’s one of the easiest things you can do to care for your garden, save money on your bills, and conserve water. This article breaks down strategies that anyone in a home garden can implement to measure, monitor and make changes to improve their irrigation efficiency.
Understanding Your Garden’s Water Needs
But, first of all, to effectively manage water use, you must have an understanding of how much water is actually being used in your garden. Many gardeners water on a set day or time, independent of soil moisture, weather or plant type—often by trial and error.
This practice can cause plants to become overwatered, wasting the water and potentially damaging root systems; or underwatered, challenging plants during the warmer seasons. Having a water flow meter on your irrigation line provides 100% accurate, real-time water flow data to your garden beds for your watering plan decisions.
When you have this idea of how much you use, it’s far simpler to tell if you have any leaks, think ahead for dry times, and establish appropriate watering expectations for various sections of your landscape.
The Hidden Cost of Overwatering Your Lawn
Over watering lawns is much more frequent than many homeowners realize and they may become the largest water users within the landscape. Deeper, more natural grass roots emerge when the watering frequency is reduced and each instance of watering is deeper and extensive, which gives the grass a greater ability to withstand drought.
Overwatering (too frequently and/or for too long) can result in shallow-rooted plants, compaction and soil loss of nutrients or cause local water pollution. This process eventually also results in higher water bills and a more unhealthy lawn.
The key principle is to soak them thoroughly once or twice a week but not everyday; as per the rainfall and seasonal temperature changes. Before watering with a sprinkler, take a look at the soil’s moisture using a moisture probe or trowel to avoid overwatering, and maintain healthier lawns throughout the year.
Building a Water Conservation Routine
Making sure water is saved in the garden doesn’t require less watering, it just requires a smarter way to water. Do hydrozones to cluster plants by their water requirements – water-hungry vegetables don’t always have to be in the same watering zone as the drought-tolerant native plants.
Mulching around trees, shrubs and around garden beds are ways to hold moisture back in the soil, avoid evaporation and prevent the growth of weeds vying for water. One of the best times of day to water is during the early morning hours before the heat of the day arrives and before water is lost by evaporation, allowing water absorption before higher temperatures arrive.
The runoff from a rooftop or other collection area can be stored in rain barrels as a cost-effective, long-term water supply for container gardens or garden beds. All this, along with a regular monitoring program, can significantly lower your water footprint from your outside landscape throughout a growing season.
Choosing the Right Tools for Outdoor Watering Efficiency
Now technology has made it easier with water usage and better to take care of your water without constantly doing it. Smart irrigation controllers can also use evapotranspiration rates, soil moisture sensors, along with weather forecasts to automatically change watering schedules to minimize water waste during rain days or cooler weeks.
A garden water flow meter attached to your outdoor spigot or irrigation line is a simple and convenient way to quickly and accurately see when and how much water is being used on the garden and compare usage to other areas of your property to identify leaks early and react.
Another acceptable choice is systems that use drip irrigation that is slowed down and directed closer to the root zone of plants, to minimize evaporation and runoff from the irrigation system and avoid these losses during normal sprinkler irrigation.
Combining these tools with a simple watering log, which can be just a notebook or spreadsheet where you enter weeks and the watering amounts, will provide you with an easy-to-reference record you can use to adjust your watering plan year after year.
Seasonal Adjustments and Long Term Planning
The amount of water required varies from season to season and a spring program that was appropriate may be too heavy or light in midsummer. With temperature rises, more watering is typically needed, and in cooler months (fall), less watering will be needed.
Being situated near the weather and knowing the rainfall amounts and drought advisory reports enables you to remain flexible and responsive instead of being tied to a map fixed schedule. Many towns also have seasonal guidelines or restrictions for watering, so heeding them can help you avoid receiving a ticket and maintain a healthy garden.
An annual inspection of the irrigation system during spring brings attention to any blocked or cracked emitters, loose sprinkler heads, or other issues that can reduce the efficiency of irrigation watering by wasting water from overspray onto pavement.
Conclusion
But all efficient garden irrigation is based on awareness and consistency. With a little knowledge about how much water your garden needs, effective tools to track your garden’s water consumption, and a bit of seasonal common sense, you’ll have a beautiful, abundant yard, without so much influence on water usage. Making small changes, such as changing to deep infrequent waterings, grouping plants by watering requirements, will over time have a significant impact on water conservation. From a tiny vegetable patch to a full landscape, thoughtful and measured landscape irrigation practices are good for the plants, the bottom line and the environment. See more.