Home Garden Joy

How to Use a Soaker Hose

by

Soaker hoses are a great way to water your vegetable garden. What is a soaker hose? It’s a hose that has tiny holes or pores along its length. Water drips or squirts out from the holes directly onto the soil near the plant’s roots. You can use it with annuals, perennials, vegetables, trees – anywhere you need irrigation for your garden. I use them in the vegetable garden, and they’re both a time and water-saver to help me grow health vegetables.

 How to Use a Soaker Hose

First thing first: don’t try to convert an existing hose into a soaker hose. You’ll make yourself crazy, ruin a good hose, and probably make a lousy soaker. Purchase a good-quality soaker hose at your local garden center. They’re not too expensive, and they last for years with proper care.

Snap-on coupling on the end makes it easy to move the main hose to each vegetable bed.

Tips for Using Special Irrigation Hoses

  • Conserve water! I have a well on my property, and water conservation is important. I don’t want to drain my well dry just to grow plants. The soaker uses less water to irrigate the garden more efficient than other systems.
  • You’re watering your vegetables, not the weeds.  When you run a sprinkler or the hose, you always water the soil between the plants as well as the plants themselves. So basically, you’re irrigating weed seeds along with your plants. The soaker hose concentrates water near the roots while the remaining soil stays dry. Starve those weeds!
  • Less water evaporates during your irrigation time than with a sprinkler. We use to run a sprinkler that covered half of the vegetable garden, then move it to the other half. Not only did we lose a lot of water to evaporation on a hot day, but we watered the leaves (unnecessary) and the grass paths (yay! more to mow – NOT).  The soaker hose keeps the water where it’s beneficial, near the roots of thirsty plants.

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Gardener on Sherlock Street

    Soaker hoses are great. I have a lot of them and have learned how to use those mending connectors when I’ve accidently stuck a shovel through one and needed it fixed. I should invest in the quick release attachments. That would be a big help!

  2. Retha Handa

    I can’t recommend Walmart soaker hoses. Mine became brittle within the first six months. If I even bumped them with a hand tool, they split. This year I bought them from Home Depot. It’s discouraging to try to save water, but then waste natural resources by having to throw away soaker hoses that can’t be repaired!

  3. Jamie

    Great tips!! I do this every year, and it make sit so much easier to care for the garden! #HomeMattersParty

  4. Kim

    Oh yay, I most definitely need to pin this and use slacker hoses in my garden this year. Thanks so much for sharing! #HomeMattersParty

  5. Crystal

    I learn so much from your blog! I have started out with a tiny garden this year so I probably won’t need a soaker hose but will save for my future dream garden! #HomeMattersParty