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Ca

I read that Al eaton does this for his AG plants. I have done this for a regular garden in a raised bed redwood box. It worked great for me! But I have never done this with a AG before. Evaporation is a problem for me, since I will be growing more AG plants this year it will almost be a necessity. Only real draw back I have seen is that it lessons the life of the soaker hose. Holes get filled up faster. But for one season it seems to work real good. Any one else do this? How did it work for you?

1/28/2006 2:04:25 PM

Montoursville, PA

Put a 200 mesh in line strainer in the system and possibly go to T-Tape Dripline from Dripworks. I am in my fourth year of Dripworks T-Tape use with no significant or noticable plugging up. Fork punches are another matter. :)))

1/29/2006 10:46:48 AM

Rhode Island

turk

one time i went out and at an end of the season sale bought a pallet full of 3/4 inch soaker hose.

the following spring i had soaker hose all over the place.
rings circling the base,hoses running over and under vines, pissin all over the fruit every time i turned the water on, plus i managed to get it caught in the spikes on my golf shoes ( another newbe bright idea i had many moons ago )
i though about all the different ways to use the dam stuff and in the end decided that using soakers was a bit more work than i was willing to put into the hobby.
if i ever did it again id just go with a misting system for the very hot days,and continue to hand water by hand under the canopy as needed.

1/29/2006 9:11:32 PM

Ca

Pap sounds like you had a real adventure with your hoses. How much did all of those 3/4 hoses run you? Were your hoses above or below ground? Did you stake your hoses down?

1/29/2006 9:37:32 PM

Syracuse, NY

i myself have this recurring idea to use those
black soaker hoses that are made from recycled
car tires but never wanna put 10-12 dollars into buying one just to see how well they work on a small scale planning on buying more if i like it. if the spray only went about 4 feet high, and had great coverage universally around the hose itself, then it seems that there we go; we have a
misting situation going on, the undersides of the leaves would be getting fogged with fertilizer/fungicide/insecticide as needed and if the system had an inline filter as well, we wouldn't have too many clogged pores in the hoses...additionally, this would be an ABOVE-GROUND thing, simply interspersed (and readily removable/adjustable) with the vines and leaves. i suppose the pressure would have to be
quite adequate to get a good spray going, on an entire plant, but that would be one of the elements that should be obtained anyway; a decent pump. jus' my tawts eric

2/7/2006 1:29:32 PM

Piqua,Ohio

if you have spray coming from a soaker hose it is not a true soaker hose or atleast not a very good one LOL the hose I use has no spray and it only seeps even with 40# of pressure on it can leave it on all day and the ground is only soaked 6" on either side of hose works great but it is alot of work deploying the hose to get even soaking job. Used it one year and then didn't last year but hand watering is too much work LOL going to try a misting or over head watering this year. drip irrigation is very intriging too. but seems to be very time consuming also will have to wait for rtirement on that one unless someone wants to sponser this project I can quit my job LOL

2/7/2006 5:31:37 PM

Piqua,Ohio

more I think about how to water the more I think a rain dance is the most efficient way LOL

2/7/2006 5:39:18 PM

Norton, MA

If you dance standing on your head, I wonder if you could make it rain up to coat the bottoms? AleX Noel.

2/7/2006 7:13:34 PM

Youngstown, Ohio

I have done the soaker hoses for the last 2 years and I also think its alot of work but its nice because I turn the hose on for 15 mins. before work then shut it off, watering DONE (I did forget to turn it off a couple times and had ducks swimming around my plants when I got home)I am looking at different methods for this year like drip but how do you water the vines that are buried (as they grow) with a drip system? I will be contacting Dripworks about this because I don't know what to use in the catalog. I am open for suggestions you may email me @ hrlyharv@zoominternet.net Thanks

2/28/2006 10:24:34 AM