A number of years ago Dutch John was telling me that if I wanted to early jump-start gardens, and get maximum grow rates I had to stop watering with cold deep well water. Use air temperature water. Best to use Rain water at that.
So I collected up, and even bought new 12-15 watering cans in different colors. Plastic and metals.
Cold deep well water filled which would sun heat up quicker? How many cans cycles, heated could I produce on a typical sunny day?
Was not black.
It was gray. Three cycle fills use in a summer day.
In either plastic or metals.
I am this morning filling two cans with early out laying garden hose warmed water for two transplanted voluntary trees. Trying to give them the best chance transplanted moved at a bad time. Move now. Or leave down south behind.
And all new hose I bought since back then has been gray. Iâd lawn ground zig-zag loop 200-300 or more feet of gray hose for waters heating then. Works well. Produced better than the cans. Scolding hot. Having to temper down with new cold when cans filling from the hoses.
Our new high raised bed planters we are setting up, I chose gray. Not black. Not red. Not white. Not their green.
Ha! Ha! Others in too sunny of hot areas will need other choices.
As for garden hose, someone once told me the dark green collected most sun-heat (compare with winter-green trees, such as conifer, much darker green in the winter)
I can accept this way of thinking, just wonder what other experieced?
Is that just an opinion or is that a tested result? Nature starts plants out when the weather is cool. Are plants warm blooded? Can they be shocked by cold water? Just askân
It is certainly true for seed starting Don but once the plants are in the ground and roots are deep enough Iâm not sure it matters that much. I have over 400 feet of hose laying on the ground to get from my house to my garden and itâs run mostly though tree shade but itâs pretty warm at the nozzle. I can get one 75 foot row of tomatoes watered before the warm runs out. Everything else gets cold water. I canât really see much difference once the plants get fairly large. I would need at least a five hundred gallon tank to do my beds. If I could I would build that tank to store the warmed water in but itâs not going to happen. This year Iâm going to finally try and hook up all the drip irrigation stuff I have accumulated but never ran. Thatâs all black poly so it should knock down water temps some. Iâm certainly not going to argue with Dutch John.
I think you want ambient temp water, so 60~70 degrees instead of cool 40 degree well water. Rainwater is usually about ambient, maybe a few degrees cooler.
My ground well water here is 55 degrees F and seems to have no ill effect on my plants so for me, I wonât change anything. I guess Iâm just stubborn.
Hey DonM as other have said not-cold watering does seem to make a diffnece on small beds seeds sprouting and newly transplanted.
Did it make a difference one whole season hand cans warmed watering??
Yes. Worst yields on our wide spaced rows overall that weâd ever had.
Wife protested greatly that I was under watering all. She was correct. But that year with dry dirt between the rows we had few weeds. And NO ground root eating bugs. far few leaf eater bugs. And almost no blights and molds problems.
Hey! Far less slug damage too.
We has a far less public water bill for the garden. ~$200. Versus the wifeâs keep all wet with ocillating sprinklers of ~$800.
The next year I did try rows of the black pourous drip hoses onto each row. Lower watering bill at ~$300. But weeds, bugs and rusts.
Those hoses do not distribute out at all evenly. Those I left out drained overwintering had their pores clogged 50% with settled in dusts, molds and spores. The following year I had to buy new. Years rolled up and kept. I just threw them away. Working systems have to last longer than 1-2 years.
I am not promoting any gardening magic.
Just saying that the color effects I observed for warming were real and relevant.
Steve Unruh
I have wondered if the chlorine in municipal supplied water has any effect on plants. Using watering cans and letting them sit for a day seems prudent if you are using city water. Like you say. Not promoting gardening magic, but it takes a lot of effort to grow food and you may as well get the biggest bang for your buck. Just like wood gas, there is a big learning curve. I know growers that I wouldnât make a pimple on their ass. Every year hope springs eternal though.
Plants will slow down growth if it is colder out. The temperature depends on the plant itself. later in the season the plant is bigger, and it is hotter so the surface temperature of the soil is a lot hotter, and there is more heat to warm up the water and there is more root system so even if it is localized cold in one spot, the water will be warm by the time it hits other spots. Having a thin layer of mulch keeps the soil cooler and reduces evaporation. Conversely too hot of water, and the plants also go into a shock.
overhead sprinklers the water will warm up in the air to the point you can lose up to 90% of the water due to evaporation before it gets to the ground.
The chlorine from city water, kills the microbes and fungi. For a healthy soil, there are a whole host of beneficial microbes. It isnât beneficial if you just killed them with chlorine.
Rainwater is the best, it can contain nitrogen thus you get free nitrogen. Well water usually is high in calcium which can raise the pH and some plants like lower pHs.
Drip irrigation is the best because you arenât overwatering and the beneficial microbes are mostly aerobic so you arenât killing them by creating anaerobic conditions by overwatering.
Once you get a bunch of carbon and mycorrhizal fungi built up in the soil, you donât need to water as much anyway because it will retain the water that is put on it.
Well, around 75°F today, itâs summer for me
Cut and chunked some wood today and got sawdust everywhere (sawdust is Man Glitter as we chainsaw freaks use to say )
Decided it was time for the first summer dip this year (donât count my involuntary dip when i was looking after fathers small fishing boat)
It kills microbes and fungi just as Sean says but if it is aerated i.e. high fine sprinklers the air takes care of most of the chlorine so it is fine to use for watering if I was taught correctly.
Which is true, but the warm air evaporates the chlorine and the water so you are paying for water that just evaporates as well.
We pay like 30c/gal for water. The payback time for a couple of 55 gallon barrels or a 250 gallon tote is quickly realized compared to the 50% water loss using the fine sprinkler. And of course rainwater is even cheaper, if it rains.
Thatâs why I think that the electro culture thing has a lot of merit. Rainwater after a thunderstorm seems to supercharge our ground covers and flower beds. Itâs like they grow a couple inches overnight. Not as noticeable in the garden but Iâm sure the effect is the same.
Well, i AM a little careless with my equipment, but this 74 year old Howard Rotavator ran just fine after some tinkering, if it wasnât a little underpowered it would be a candidate for woodgassing.
And yes, i donât think roto-tilling are good for the soil, try not to do it to often, but im a little lazy sometimes (often)
You are some kind of mechanical magician Goran. Some tinkering? That thing is almost as old as me and it would take a lot of tinkering to get me running again. Might get me crawling a little faster.
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