♪ (guitar music) ♪
Hi I'm Helen Muntz,
USU Extension gardening expert.
Today I'm here to talk about watering and the heat of the summer.
It can be difficult to know whether it's time to water
or how long to water or when to water.
So it's very dependent on the type of garden you have,
your soil type, your plant type, your shade exposure,
your sun exposure, your wind, all those sorts of things.
So we're going to look at all these different gardens
and talk a little bit about how to water.
So first here I have behind me is our classroom garden
here at the Ogden Botancial Gardens.
We've had some sprinkler issues, so some of our plants are stuggling.
So I'll show you some symptoms of watering.
This nice big cyprus has actually been blocking our sprinkler head.
So we've had some plants that've had issues here in the garden.
They are reduced growth.
Kind of stunted.
And some of them are experiencing some leaf scorch
and wilting.
So here in our demonstration vegetable garden
you can see that some of our gourds are wilting a little bit.
Partially due to just the midday summer heat.
We do have a drip irrigation on it so I can show you how that works,
which is really nice and efficient and we drip about three times a week.
It can be difficult to know how often to water your vegetables.
I feel like a handy tool is this soil moisture meter.
And I'll show you how this works.
So here's the soil moisture meter.
What I've done is I've pushed it down
into the soil as far as I could
near, but not on top of the root system of this tomato plant here.
And currently it's reading moist to wet.
So it's good to use this after and before you water
so that you know whether or not it's time to water.
If it reads wet, hold off for a while.
If it reads dry, then it's time to water.
Plants are actually quite tolerant and they do prefer
some amount of drying out between waterings.
Drip irrigation for vegetables is the most efficient way to water.
You're applying water directly to the root system
and you're eliminating weed germination by only applying water to the root system.
Vegetable gardening in raised beds is a great alternative
when you have poor soil or difficulty watering;
however, they do dry out a little bit faster
then vegetables planted directly in the ground
and may require water 3 to 4 times a week
in the heat of the summer.
That's mid-July through mid-August.
Now I'm going talk about lawns.
Healthly lawns are really important to most of us,
but it can be really frustrating when we do everything we can
to keep them watered, and they turn brown like this.
So, some of this problem is to due with summer heat
and summer dormancy.
Cool season lawns go dormant in the summer.
It's a natural process,
and no matter how much water you put on, it can turn yellow.
So I've put my soil moisture meter in the lawn here
as far as I could get it down.
It was hard to get it down into the soil
because it's pretty compacted.
This is a heavy traffic area.
A lot of visitors walk over it, we wheel our wheel barrows over it a lot.
So you can see it's still close to moist, almost dry.
So it could require some water,
but probably it has to do with more of a compaction issue
and summer dormancy than watering.
Lawns actually only require one and a half inches a month
to keep them surviving despite that yellow color during the summer.
Trees planted in the lawn often don't get as deep
of watering as we think.
Established trees, often we have the sense that,
they are established enough to find the water they need,
which often is the case.
But in dry and hot conditions, sometimes it's problematic,
so especially when it's a new tree and the first 2 to 3 years
you want to deep water your trees in the lawn.
And after that, and when we have dry winters
and hot summers, it's a good idea to run a sprinkler
out there and soak the trees
around the drip zone.
Another thing to consider is mulch around the base of the tree
at least 2 feet from the trunk.
That helps reduce the amount of competition from water and nutrients
between the tree and the grass.
If you're interested in conserving water in your garden,
here's a great example on how to do that.
This is our conservation garden at the Ogden Botanical Gardens.
We have a variety of different shrubs, grasses, and perennials out here.
Right now we're watering about 2 to 3 times a week
to get them established, but after that,
we can cut of the water almost completely.
So if you're interested in conserving water
or you have any questions about how to water your garden,
visit Garden.usu.edu or CWEL.usu.edu.
Thanks for watching.
♪ (guitar music) ♪