Watering Techniques

[AppleDeez]

Wanted to hear everyone's watering techniques. Not so much specifics like when and how much, but more methods and practices.

Looking to see what I can do to water/feed more efficiently and quicker. Currently I am filling up a 1 gal waterer and adding nutes ph balancing 1 gal at a time.

Let's hear everyone's watering techniques!

 

[Frimpong]

Wanted to hear everyone's watering techniques. Not so much specifics like when and how much, but more methods and practices.

Looking to see what I can do to water/feed more efficiently and quicker. Currently I am filling up a 1 gal waterer and adding nutes ph balancing 1 gal at a time.

Let's hear everyone's watering techniques!

Lift them always. Slow watering

 

[Mr Jay]

Bulk water storage in the garden is a game changer.

I could compare watering to painting a room. Takes a couple of days to get the job done, but I only have a paintbrush in my hand for a couple hours.
All of the hours are going into prep. Removing switch plates, putting down tarps,,, where the hell is my skim knife?

Availability, organization, elbow room.

I target feed on a weekly recipe.
Week 2 of veg, or week 5 of flower, for example.
Biggest watering timesaver is popping all of the seeds at the same time. I need only prepare a common batch and everyone in the room will enjoy it. Even though I am hand watering, I can do 50 to 70 plants in short order. Anyone who has kids knows the eating part doesn't take that long, it's the preparation, the picky eaters, and the kitchen disaster that takes the most time.
All the plants are in the same age, I am making one meal, and everybody is going to eat it.
My plants start in solos, move to half gallons, and then get plugged into a common bed.
Preparation is the bear, so having a good workstation is key. Consider work triangles and posture.
Watering regimen includes:
Siphoning off 4 gallons of aquarium water into a 5 gallon bucket. Tank is mounted higher than my working surface so I never have to lift a bucket.
Aquarium has done most of the work for me. My water is at the correct temperature , buffered , and within arms reach of my tools and nutrients.
I may twist and rotate, but my feet are essentially in the same spot until I am done watering and ready to leave the room.
The initial batch I mix up is half a pail, that will get me through the first week.
I employ a bulb duster for solos. One bulb-full will do three sprout cups
or one entire bulb of per cup, when they get bigger. After a few weeks, I will need to make more than one pail per week.
Bulb ensures consistent portions when they are in solos, I have a dipper, for when they are in half gallons.
Dip -Splash -dip- splash

First month is hands on, but it gets simpler from there. Once everything is in plugged into the common bed I can use 3/8 silicone tubing to irrigate the entire bed by siphon
Flowering plants get feed, feed, water

Hauling by bucket, out to the garage for a couple seasons was awful.
Having everything available at my fingertips helps take the 'chore part' out of it.

 

[LoboGrow]

Wanted to hear everyone's watering techniques. Not so much specifics like when and how much, but more methods and practices.

Looking to see what I can do to water/feed more efficiently and quicker. Currently I am filling up a 1 gal waterer and adding nutes ph balancing 1 gal at a time.

Let's hear everyone's watering techniques!

This is exactly what I do, one gallon at a time...

 

[DemonTrich]

Been doing it this way since '08.

55 gallon brute commercial garbage can and a huge air pump that bubbles the water 24/7. I can look at the plant and tell if it needs watering vs lifting. Just like I don't need a ph meter any more. I know what my starting ph is, and what every bottle on the shelf will do to change the ph.

Watering fabric pots varies from plastic pots.

 

[webeblzr]

I graduated a rubber maid trash can, with a 5 gallon mark, and a 10 gallon mark.
That sits on a HF dolly, I then roll it to each area and dole out the juice.
My watering can holds a half gallon of juice.
Each 3 gallon pot gets one water can.
5 - 1 gallon pots in veg, eats one water can.

 

[Agreenpassion]

¤¤¤¤¤
Air Pots are rad. But also a lot different when watering compared to other containers.
They dry back very fast, pulling air quickly through whatever medium your using. More so than plastic containers or even cloth pots.
When used properly, they can show some really large plant yields and quick, strong growth potential. For me, that made up for the learning curve when I was using them.
But I don't need my plants to be yield monsters or have 3X stretch now. I just grow <40 at a time these days for the two of us and a couple light weight family members, really. To some extent, so I can grow a lot of cool cultivars and make some silly chucks that make me happy.
I stick with hand watering (soil) these days.
No more drippers or carrots. And I never tried ebb and flow, drain to waste or a sip system with the airpots. But I think a hydo/coco/airpot/clone only single cola grows can be really amazing.
In many ways I really enjoyed my journey into (indoor) living Organic container growing. It was awesome creating a living food web, farming worms even and seeing the plants' being so damn green and healthy.
¤¤¤¤¤

I still check my water's ph occasionally. But the PH and the total dissolved solids (tds) as well as a couple other thingies have stayed the same now for more than a decade. I no longer use RO. But I so add a little stuff and dechlorinate my water. And I only use it at room temp.

Having an appropriately sized water res., at the appropriate temp. and with a "bubbler" -close to the grow is amazing. Really.

This is too long already. But, Mr. Jay and Demontrich are right on imho.

Hearing/seeing nice growers (with proof or cred.) showing what choices they make or have made: Such as things like watering, parental selection in breeding, IPM routines, even what kinda flower or dabs dudes are jiving on now-a-days. That blows up my skirt. Wait, I don't have a skirt.

 

[Mr Jay]

Fair enough, @Agreenpassion , when it comes to skirts I would rather chase them than have them.

I find it quite prudent, that everyone seemed to include what kind of containers they are watering. This thread is making me realize container selection is a big part of the game.
Turns out I wasn't learning how to grow, I was figuring out how to water a pot !

In addition to staring at goats, I also enjoy evaluating root balls.
Long after the plants have gone and the root balls become anonymous I begin to see differences amongst the spent slugs. Ice cream, net pots, 2lb foil coffee pouches, rice sacks, shopping bags, milk crates,,, I hate buying things at the store. If it sheds water and is between 1 and 5 gallons, I will grow a plant in it.
Any who,,, I am finding my best root balls in pails.
If the root ball was grown in something entirely porous, like a fabric bag, I can't throw it across the yard without making a mess. Anything coming out of the pail is like a brick, I can read the date stamp from the bottom of the plastic.
Began to think it was a combination of my penchant for fluffy soil, and the perpetual lack of humidity around here. I have seen folks with fabric bags in flood and drain tables, and the roots are blasting out of the bag like Bean sprouts. I cannot get a root within two inches of the edge of a fabric pot. Maybe towards the bottom, but up top, forget it. A gallon bag is about what? 10 inches diameter? Less?
Only gives a 5 inch radius, leaves me with a root ball about the size of 2 Fists.
As much as I like fluffy soil, I cannot commit to watering more than once per day.
If it is tall enough, I could get away with bottomless, but I certainly prefer a hard sided container.

Perhaps all of my hot air is drying out the plants,

 

[greenmachine29]

Great thread as this is 90%of gardening IMHO. 9% genetics and 1 percent everything else lol

Watering practice is lifelong deal. No one ever is fully learned”d, even doctors and lawyers are always practicing for life….

For me I use more water on average than most. My organic soil really likes water, plenty of aeration in medium is what makes the plant be able to take up oxygen, and alot
Of the O2 comes from the H2O2 not from
The atmospheric O2…. So I roughly water everyday 5-10% of container volume to water.

Large reservoir with float valves, and always Masquito dunks soaking,, open of ball valve full up buckets and hand water….

It’s easy for a soil man like myself because I literally add nothing to my water besides the dunks whole round…

But learning how to read soil and how much the soil can take is honestly a very very hard task.

 

[RookieBuds]

Growing in coco here. I still just prefer hand watering with a regular watering can. I bought a 2gal sprayer with the spray tip removed thinking it would make watering the back plants easier; it just took way longer

I would love to run a drip system, but it kinda goes against my "Less Moving Parts" mantra, a big part of growing my own is keeping things cheap. Although i will eventually spring for a watering system, for now, that system is still me

I mix my nutrients the day of use so they don't sit for too long. I never let a mixed gallon sit for more than three days, it starts to smell funky by then.

 

[Smokieokie]

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One of these days hopefully lol. But for now at home I just mix up gallon jugs and water with a solo cup. Growing in 1 gal nursery pots with coco perlite mix. I have plants at different stages so it usually takes 3 or 4 jugs mixed differently.

 

[Bodean]

I grow in the basement, I fill up a 30 gallon tote from the stationary tub that has a hose and greengro filter. Airpump and airstones in tote.
From there I mix 1 gallon size nutrients or just water. Then pour into watering can and hand water the plants every 2 days. Feed once a week.