More Food, Healthier Plants, Less Work! Installing A Soaker Hose To Water Your Vegetable Garden

[@alexgrowsfood]

Have you tried a soaker hose yet? How do you water your plants? In my opinion, time is the most valuable thing we have, so not spending an hour running to and from the tap was a no brainer. Similarly, I use these garden tools to make garden jobs much much easier: kzbin.info/www/bejne/m2bHeXhvh7Fpgc0

[@patrickvaughnpw]

Three videos in. Buddy, you've got a subscriber!!!

[@alexgrowsfood]

Thank you! This is an old one too, very glad you still enjoyed it!

[@jerrywilson7490]

Thank you so much. I’m 65 and have always used sprinklers, but just bought my first 2 - 75ft soakers to reach a new bed containing new small bushes and small trees. The bed is about 130ft long, starting at about 1 ft and slowly enlarging to about 4ft wide. Should be easy. This bed is just out of range of my sprinkler for my small grass area and surrounding trees. You made me feel much better about the project. Thanks, and good luck with your other side of the garden. ~ Jerry

[@alexgrowsfood]

Very welcome. Soakers aren't the cheapest investment but I think they pay for themselves in the long run, especially with a good grass mulch on top. Just be sure to use cheap non-permeable hose before you get to the bed. And I did finally connect mine on a loop and it is really really good over that length - I ended up lowering the input to about 4L/minute to reduce pressure in the hose.

[@Soilfoodwebwarrior]

Hmm 😒 going to try it myself but have seen in multiple you tube videos that these don't water evenly. They emit most of the water in the beginning of hose and leave the ends area drier. I will of course also use pressure regulators as well hopefully avoiding blowouts I am a market gardener and I use drip and overhead currently. I like how the soaker hose seems to work when buried in mulch.

[@alexgrowsfood]

If I recall, it depends a lot on your system. I've got a 75m soaker system on a loop right now and at 3L/minute from both ends it's pretty even throughout the length. But I did get a lot of pooling at the top of one of the hoses when I didn't restrict the water (my system caps at about 11L/minute total) but not the other end - I think the hose was damaged a little. I've not had an issue with less drip at the ends (in fact in one place it's raised off the ground, it looks like the bit where I grab the hose at the start of the video). Only thing I would say is that these are better for long slow waterings and a lot of the action will happen underground as it spreads sideways. In clay this will be a lot slower than in loam and your soil will probably determine how long you need to water for and your cadence. I'm trying to create a calculator but there are so many variables. Best thing is probably to try it for 30 minutes a day and see if it spreads far enough quickly enough.

[@MyrtleBeachWebAngel]

Soaker hoses changed my life. 🎉

[@alexgrowsfood]

Love it! Combined with good mulching, it's all you really need imo. Great for renters etc

[@TheGeek365]

Hi Alex, great video with some good information. I have been debating about moving over to soaker hoses but actually find it relaxing just walking around with 2 watering cans and checking out the plants as I water.

[@alexgrowsfood]

It's funny, I did my first bit of watering with a can the other day (to water-in some strawberry runners) and I did forget how much I enjoyed doing it before work in my old patio garden. Doing the garden beds here is physically a bit too much for my arms though (and is time consuming) so I started doing coffee walks around the garden and trying to sit in various spots to help me notice problems. It's not the same and I still do some pots by hand but the soakers create a balance that makes the workload manageable, particularly when it gets hot. Could perhaps be worth trialling it on the furthest or most difficult bed, rather than going all in, but I get the sentiment entirely

[@marciamalan]

Thank you, very educative and precise

[@alexgrowsfood]

Thanks Marcia!

[@manasikashyap]

I’ll have to try these out for my fruit trees! Thank you!

[@alexgrowsfood]

No worries, just be sure to give them a lot more water - either a long drawn-out watering over hours (potentially) or maybe doubling up the soaker hose. It depends on the watering requirements of the tree and your soil type & structure. If it helps, I get through about 5L of water a minute over a 75m length

[@ToadalSimplicity]

You’re terrific! Thanks for the great info 😎

[@alexgrowsfood]

No worries, you're too kind

[@josielee4912]

Just bought a hose so here goes 🤞

[@alexgrowsfood]

Excellent, Josie! I think they are great. Good luck and let me know how it goes

[@TheWholesomeGardener]

I'm convinced. Thank you Alex. 👍

[@alexgrowsfood]

You're very welcome! Hope they work out for you

[@andrewshaw8396]

Precisely the info I was after. Good man! 👍Definitely taking this route for the pumpkin patch next season. Great channel - consider me subbed. 😁

[@alexgrowsfood]

No worries, glad it helped. Not having to remember to water things is such a game changer. Good luck!

[@Cody_Ramer]

Would love to use soakers but they are stupidly expensive, so will have to wait a while..

[@alexgrowsfood]

Yeah they are quite the investment. I slowly bought mine over time (and one was given to me - by luck, not by the company) or anything) but I think they'll last long enough to be worth it and I suspect more cost effective than a drip system if you have dense plantings. Not cheaper than manual or a sprinkler though (sadly).

[@thelavenderbard]

I think my only worry would be it breaking down into the soil, it's the same reason I loath landscaping fabric, it doesn't work all that well and now you have plastic fibers fraying off into your soil forever 😩

[@alexgrowsfood]

I get the concern. I hate landscaping fabric. When I moved here I had to spend ages digging up fragments and I still find patches that behave weirdly and often still have some underneath. This stuff is different in that it doesn't really tear. It's recycled rubber and it's quite hard. I can't speak to things like leaching (we'd have to email the manufacturer) but in terms of breakdown I can't see it happening for about a decade and when it does start to fail you should notice different behaviour when you water and can pull it up. It'll probably crack and snap rather than shred. You can also leave it on the surface (or under a temporary mulch) and remove it much more easily and not risk it degrading under the ground like landscaping fabric. It's not perfect - I'd like a clay, terracotta or even a metal piping solution that is built into the landscape to work for the specific garden but I only rent.

[@thelavenderbard]

@@alexgrowsfood Yea I've been getting ready to DIY some ollas/oyas with terracotta pots. At my house I've been digging up scraps of landscaping fabric for years (among other very random things) it's such a bad material I wish it never got so popular. I'm glad that this works well so far for you though, I hope it's able to last a long time.

[@carlasaxon2235]

But when it rains the rain is going to do the same thing anyway if its a heavy rain 😂 so even if your trying to prevent those things from happening mother nature always finds away lol. Maybe better to use inside a green house so you can control everything better

[@alexgrowsfood]

It's a game of probabilities really. Less coverage is less likely to incur problems. In the west I sort of take your point (I actually think the repeated light rain is a bigger problem) but I live in the driest part of the country and there really isn't much rainfall at all, even this year it wasn't that extreme