The Dirt

It’s official: it’s summer, and it’s hot. With temperatures soaring and sparse rainfall, it’s vital to use water as efficiently as possible in your summer veggie garden. Here are some tips from Grow Local to help keep your summer garden alive and productive while also conserving water:

1. Mulch, mulch, mulch!
   • Mulching means covering the exposed soil in your garden bed with a layer of organic material. This protective layer helps keep water in the soil by minimizing evaporation, and regulates the temperature of the soil, preventing it from getting too hot for the roots of your plants. Mulch also helps prevent weeds from taking over the areas between your fruit and veggie plants, which ensures that the water you provide to your garden benefits your crops, not weeds.
   • Many materials can be used for mulch, including dry leaves, straw, fine wood mulch, pine needles, alfalfa hay and even strips of newspaper. Keep mulch a little away from roots of plants to avoid root rot. Another option is to plant ground cover crops like white or red clover between your crops to act as living mulch, which serves the same functions as other types of mulch, with the added benefit that living mulches can be tilled under to serve as green manure (compost) to enrich the soil, and certain varieties of living mulch (legumes) fix nitrogen, making it more available in the soil for your crops.
2. Water at the coolest times of the day
   • Watering in the morning or evening is best. This minimizes evaporation, and prevents plants from getting burned, which can happen if they are watered in the heat of the day (water droplets on leaves magnify the sun’s rays, just like a magnifying glass). If possible, it’s ideal to water in the morning, since this allows plants to dry off during the day; as temperatures drop during the night, lingering moisture makes some plants susceptible to fungal infection. 
3. Water less frequently, more deeply
   • After planting new seeds, it’s important to water them gently each day until the seedlings are established. After that, however, it’s usually not necessary to water every day; instead, it’s a good idea to water less frequently (every other day should suffice), but more deeply. Giving the soil a good soak allows water to seep deep down, which encourages plants to develop a deep and well established root base (roots seek out where the water is). Light watering keeps moisture at the surface of the soil, resulting in shallow, a less stable root structure, and weaker plants.
4. Use efficient watering methods
   • The most efficient watering methods maximize the amount of water delivered directly to the soil (roots). Examples of efficient methods include:
     1. Drip irrigation or soaker hoses – These greatly increase the efficiency of watering. They can be used with a timer to make watering much easier, as well.
     2. Homemade plastic jug drip irrigator – It’s possible to make your own drip irrigators by punching holes in the bottom of plastic gallon jugs and placing them near the bases of your plants. Simply fill the jugs and allow them to slowly water your plants.
     3. Buried clay pot, or olla, irrigation – This ancient watering system, which has been used in East Asia, North Africa, and the Middle East for millennia, is gaining popularity in Central Texas. Clay pots fired at low temperatures to preserve the porosity of the clay are buried near the bases of plants and filled with water (then capped). Water seeps out of the pots in response to capillary action by plants’ roots. In other words, when plants need water, their roots basically suck it out of the clay pot, resulting in an extremely efficient watering system. Check out this site for more information about buried clay pot irrigation.
5. Harvest and use rainwater
   • We may not get very frequent rainfall during the summer in Texas, but when it does rain, it usually pours. Instead of letting all that valuable water run into gutters, capture it.
   • Rainwater is best for plants: it is free of the chemicals that are added to our tap water to protect us from microbes, but which also kill off the beneficial microbes that create a healthy soil ecosystem (and, in turn, healthy plants). Using rainwater to water plants also, of course, reduces the amount of tap water needed.
   • Rainwater can be harvested from rooftops in barrels or cisterns. Many resources exist in Austin to help you set up this type of system, and the City of Austin provides a rebate for the purchase of rain barrels. For information about the City of Austin Rainwater Harvesting Rebate program, and for more information about installing rainwater harvesting systems, click here. For more information about rainwater harvesting and other innovative water conservation strategies, in general, check out books and instructional YouTube videos by Brad Lancaster, a well regarded expert on the topic.

By using these methods, you’ll not only conserve water, but maximize your summer veggie garden’s chance of persevering it through the summer. Best of luck, and happy gardening!

For more information about conserving water in the garden, and growing your own food, sign up for SFC’s Citizen Gardener class! Registration is up for the first series of the fall season, and will be ready soon for the remaining four sessions, so keep an eye on our events calendar!