You might be enjoying cool and comfortable spring temperatures right now, but the dog days of summer are coming. When the sun beats down on your lawn for a dozen hours every day, it’ll need more water to keep from drying out and leaving unsightly brown patches all over your yard.
This brings you to a decision that every home care expert, journeyman and rookie has had to confront sooner or later: What’s the best way to water your lawn? Sure, you can hook the garden hose up to the side of the house and get spraying, but is this the best use of your time, money or your lawn? If you’ve struggled with over- or underwatering your grass every summer, determining whether automatic or manual watering is right for your lawn can set up you up for a summer of lush grass instead of dead patches.
How you water your lawn can have a big impact on how it looks.Manual watering: A bird in hand
If you just purchased some top-of-the-line Husqvarna lawn care equipment, odds are that you’re looking to save some money in other areas of yard maintenance. In this case, hand-watering your lawn with a hose or hooking up a manual sprinkler can be inexpensive ways to make sure your grass gets the water it needs.
There are a few things about using a hose to water your lawn that you should know, though. First, if you don’t have a flow-controlling head on your hose, you’re essentially dumping water onto your grass. This can deposit a large volume in a small area, which could leave a section of your lawn drowning while others are bone dry. Also, if you have a garden or shrubs in your yard, the indelicate flow of water can damage petals and stems if you’re not careful.
Why water your lawn by hand, then? It helps you conserve. According to H2OUSE, manually watering your lawn uses less than a third of the resources that the average automatic system does. If your budget is your main concern, taking the hose out front can lower your utility bills more than automatic sprinklers.
“Automatic sprinklers deliver 47% of ET, while hand-watering tops out at 39%.”
Automatic watering: Two in the bush
It should go without saying that an automatic sprinkler system set to water your lawn several times a month uses more resources than getting out there yourself. Instead, the real question is whether starving your lawn of water is actually better for it.
H2OUSE explained that, while automatic irrigation systems almost triple the water used by manual processes, they create a healthier environment for your grass to grow. Known as evaportranspiration, ET is the measure of how watering, natural precipitation and temperature affect your lawn’s health. On average, automatic sprinklers deliver 47 percent of required ET, while hand-watering tops out at 39 percent. If you’re in the lawn care game to make your neighbors jealous, an automatic sprinkler system gives you the best opportunity to grow a lawn that will make them green as grass with envy.
Automatic watering isn’t without its faults, though. If the system doesn’t come with a sensor capable of shutting the sprinklers off when it’s raining or after a storm when the soil is still saturated, you’re not just throwing money away – you run the risk of overwatering your lawn to a point where new grass struggles to grow.
Monitor yourself
How you decide to water your lawn is really a matter of personal preference. Brent Meacham, industry development director with Minnesota’s Irrigation Association, told CBS that homeowners need to be vigilant with either option.
“People who water by hand … tend to view watering as a chore, and tend to underwater,” Meacham said. “But most people with irrigation systems overwater, because they go into ‘set it and forget it’ mode.”
So how can the average do-it-yourselfer figure out which method of watering will work best for his or her lawn? Before you pull the trigger on an expensive automatic irrigation system, keep a close watch over how your lawn reacts to hand-watering for a few months. If you find that the soil is constantly dried out an hour after you finish up, it might be time to look into a system that can deliver more water. On the other hand, if your shoes sink into the dirt, you might need to cut back with the hose.