Your spring watering schedule

As I go around the area looking at clients gardens, the first thing I see is the number of people that over water their garden and lawn. In the "olden days", before automatic or inground sprinklers, most people watered no more than once a week. If they watered by holding the hose the main problem was not getting the water down to the roots.

Now, the problem is watering twice a day, watering too long, watering so the driest area gets enough and the other areas get too much. So, what is a gardener to do?

Generally a lawn does not need watering more than 3 times a week even in the hottest time of the year. If you develop stressed areas in the lawn with this schedule it means either poor coverage or compacted soil below the surface. You can check out poor coverage by using the pie pan method. This entails setting pie pans around the lawn including stressed areas and good areas to compare the amount of water each get.

You want there to be no more than one third difference between the two types os areas. If there is more you might need a sprinkler consultation to find out what to do.

If there isn't a larger difference expect the problem to be compacted soil under the surface. Aeration is the answer. Often this has to be repeated occasionally to loosen up the soil so the water can penetrate and the grass can root down.

For shrubs and trees less frequent watering is possible. Often weekly watering will do. On established plants even less can be enough. At home in an established yard I watered the old established plants three times in a summer during a major redo.

You need to water deeply and let the soil partially dry out between waterings. In some cases this isn't possible because the lawn irrigates the shrubs also. Where it is possible we recoment you run the shrub asprinklers seperate from the lawn irrigation.

For flowers the watering schedule depends. At the nursery we try to water once a week even in the hot weather. I have to admit that the soil is well conditioned over 20 years of adding humus and Paydirt and that makes a difference.

Beause so many of the new homes are going into clay, sticky soil it is critical that those gardeners be specially aware of the correct water schedule.

Remember the moisture plants need is not on the surface it is below the surface and that is where you have to look. If you are in doubt you should invest a few dollars on a moisture meter.

In a future post I will talk again about the value of through mulching your shrub and flower beds.