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Photo Credit: ©2002 Dolezal Publishing/Tim Butler

Row plantings with parallel furrows on a flat site can be watered easily. Just apply water to either end of the row and allow the water to spread down the furrow, irrigating your plants.

With your plots prepared and your supports in place, now’s a good time to plan for your plant’s water needs – before you get that first veggie plant in the ground. Even if you live in a region with regular precipitation throughout the growing season, natural rains may be sporadic and can require you to take up the slack by irrigating your drought-prone plants. And gardeners in areas that experience long periods without rain must continually provide water in order to have success with vegetables.

The simplest watering system, applicable to most level sites with row or hill crops, is to furrow watering channels beside the plants and build circular moats around each hill. Using a garden hose, you can fill these irrigation channels with water that’s allowed to slowly be absorbed into the soil around the growing plants’ roots. If this is the way you’d like to go, these furrows should be installed at the time of planting.

Two other commonly used methods of irrigating crops are drip irrigation and watering with weeping soaker hoses. Because both methods may be automated using economical components, they’re a boon to labor-saving for those with limited time, and they provide your vegetables with reliable, regular waterings in your absence.

Drip systems are usually connected to existing waterlines using a timer-controlled valve and delivery hose system that strings through your plantings. At each plant, a short spur terminates in an emitter that applies water to the plant’s roots. With typical water pressure at the hose bib, a single watering circuit may serve as many as 32 plants. Drip systems have the advantage of limiting the growth of weeds outside the watered area and, when used with a covering of mulch, will generally eliminate the need to cultivate.

Soaker hoses are ideal for providing water to rows of vegetables, and since they’re flexible, they can be looped around hills or large perennial plants. Choose hoses that weep water, limiting spray that wets the plants’ foliage.