Watering Restrictions and Timing
kathiemt on Feb 17th 2008
I don’t understand why in Victoria we were told we could only water in the mornings from 6am to 8am? I have 2 days a week alloted to me - one week day and one weekend. To me it would make sense to water in the evenings - particularly in the summer. That way the gardens would stay damp for the majority of the night, whereas during the day and under the hot summer sun, the garden dries out really quickly. Where is the sense in this?
Perhaps someone might be able to tell me the reasoning for this but it seems to me that the majority of people would be getting ready for work in the mornings, or want to lie in bed a little longer on the weekends whereas in the evening, the majority would be home organising their evening meal or doing something else and they could water their gardens then.
What do you think?
A few summers ago, we also were restricted to two days a week for garden usage. For us, the reason for the morning time was that was when water usage for homes and businesses was at the lowest point. Peak usage starts around 9 am until about 5 pm. The evening hours are then available to replensh the water towers and keep the water pressure high. It is better to water in the morning, because evening watering can promote fungal diseases. The year we were restricted, I used soaker hoses because you can turn them on, forget about them for a while, and they do not affect the water pressure in the house. I don’t know if this is the reasons for your timing restrictions, but it may be.
Here is North Texas we have water restrictions that go from 6:00 pm to 6:00 am on odd or even days by address. It makes more sense to water in the evening when there is less chance of evaporation.
I wonder what the reasoning is behind this. Watering in the evening seems like a better solution.
I’m here for the first time today, going through and bookmarking all your blogs in my Diva folder
I’ll have to be sure to blogroll you on http://www.herbulletin.com
God bless!
Claudia
It is better to water in the morning.
Wet foliage leads to fungal infections, then as well your plants need the water during the day, notsomuch at night. So having the water sit around all night isn’t a good thing.
For a typical garden you’ll need an inch of water a week, once a week, in a deep soak, in a morning.
A lawn will need usually around 2 inches a week, 2 deep soakings of 1 inch each a week.
If you’re watering garden beds instead of a lawn consider installing (And by installing, I mean drop under the mulch and pin into place with big landscape fabric pins/staples) soaker hoses. They deposit water directly to the roots with very little loss to evaporation, wind, or spray. This will not work for a lawn, but any mulched planting bed it works fine.
It’s a safety issue, Kathy. Pensioners can’t water in the garden at night - too dangerous.
Hi Kathie,
Love looking at your variety of Blogs, this just one of them.
As for watering, our restrictions I agreed with you, that was until I read the post by Chris! Never considered the downside being fungul infections?? I wonder though if this would apply to every terrain??
Cheers
Debbie Stevens
I use North East Water that has an easy to find website. We have two times in the day. The other I think 8-10pm. What I find amazing is that even if you go off water restrictions which we did for one of our houses, you still have to stick to times, so a little disappointing.