For a super dry bed. And it worked!
I have a bed on the side of the house that was bone dry and standing there with the watering wand for 30 minutes wasn't even making a dent .. the top looked nice and wet but if you dug down 1/2 inch it was dry. I was on the verge of probably losing stuff! It has caladiums, snow drops and hydrangea in it and 2 brugs that are not going to be there next spring.
I had one of those 4 gal (i think it's 4 gallons .. its one of those buckets you can buy at lowes or hd for boxing paint), filled it up with water and dumped it on sections of the bed all at once. It took 5 bucketfuls to do the whole bed. I did it twice and voila! the soil was damp all the way through when I was finished. I'm thinking that the quantity of water all at once kept it from running off.
Just thought I'd share this tip since I know others have probably run into the same problem.
Desperate Watering Attempt
Good idea... and probably cheaper than my habit of letting the hose drip on each plant for hours at a time. But with the summer we have had, desperate circumstances call for desperate measures...
right?
Linny
Yeppers indeed .. I tried the drip thing and soaker hoses .. no good .. only kept moist the area that the hose and drip were near .. this way, the whole bed is now moist. the whole idea was to get the soil in a state where it would sink in and not roll off and my desperate attempt worked!
When I lived in florida, I was a member of the volunteer fire department. When I had to do a lot of watering really fast, I'd just go grab the brush tanker truck and water everything in a jiffy. That's what gave me the idea to deliver a lot of water fast.
Let's see... 4 gallons at 8 lbs per gallon = 32 lbs x 5 trips = a good workout!
I lived in Florida too but I was too busy to do any gardening. Miami, Clearwater, Largo.
Linny