What will cope with erratic watering

[Sylvan]

The lottie's 8 miles away (the one in our village is "dead men's shoes") so our watering regime tends to be rather erratic. To add to the problem we've transferred most of the 2ft high raised beds there (in case we move this season) so the soil is drying out even faster.

I was going to put the tomatoes we have a surfeit of up there but I've just realised they won't be happy only being watered once or twice a week. We'll end up with BER or summat won't we?

Will the beans be OK up there?

[zazen999]

We never water plants in the ground once initially watered in; apart from this latest spell when we've watered sown seeds, and just seedlings....A good long soak is better than regular small amounts and if they are in the ground rather than pots they shouldn't need TOO much watering anyway......unless you are on sand of course!

[scarey55]

Yep, I agree. Mine rarely get watered and they seem to cope. They may not be prizewinning veg but we get by. As Zazen said, I just water my seedlings in and then they are mostly on their own. Also, I have noticed that the soil a couple of cm's under is still wet, at the moment

[roitelet]

I try not to water. Mulch the ground when it is wet or give it a good soak first then mulch it. This year I have put soaker pots in with the tomatoes planted round them as I am rubbish at remembering to water them. They only need filling about every 5 - 6 days.

[Flummery]

It depends to some extent on how well you've prepared your ground. If it has lots of material in which will hold water - compost, well rotted manure, even, in bean trenches, unrotted material and newspaper - which has been well wetted beforehand, it should cope.

I found one of the best do-ers last year in a 6 week drought over summer was my own variety of dwarf french bean. They, together with the other dwarf frenchies, were well watered in and then left to get on with it. My allotment site has no mains water and if it doesn't rain, the tank doesn't fill up.

It cropped by far the best. I grow it for drying and it's a white cannelini type. I'm growing the F4 generation this year. If it comes up true again I might offer some to people here!

[Sylvan]

We don't normally water much, apart from the toms and courgettes, but this year we seem to be overrun by plants that need watering, and not much room in the garden (combined with uncertainty about where we'll be )

I wonder whether people would think I was mad if I asked for newspapers on Freegle.

[Alison]

As you say, the fact that you're growing in 2' high raised beds will be making any watering problems worse. I don't water anything in the ground expect when planting although do have to obviously keep an eye on the polytunnel. What have you filled the beds with as that will make a real difference to how often you need to water.

[Sylvan]

It's a mixture of topsoil and compost.
We'll be mulching with comfrey leaves every time. That should help a bit.

[snohare]

What I did in similar circumstances with my old allotment was to lay in a soaker hose a foot below the surface in the raised bed, then when I turned up if there was water available I ran it into the hose and watered from below that way. Worked a treat, there seemed to be a lot less lost to evaporation. The only problem was that until the crop plants grew big enough to shade them out, the weeds loved it too ! I ended up broadcast sowing, which worked so well that I kept on with the habit.
I get the feeling that soaker hoses probably need a clean every few years though.