[Christine]

It's dust bowl conditions here and dry to a great depth. It took me three hours to get the plot decently damp last night as I knew I wasn't going to be there today.

There was a forecast for heavy showers so I was hopeful. As usual the showers never happened. It has been hot and breezy.

Thing is - it's drier than usual here because we had barely any rain in April. About .25 cms if I remember rightly.

[nilsatis1964]

Another 2 hours soaking the plot tonight.  I have been watering 1/4 of the plot each night.  I have been putting 60 gallons a night for 2 weeks now.  I have first earlies and over wintering onions that seem to appreciate the water.  Is this over the top ?

[whippersnapper]

Another 2 hours soaking the plot tonight.  I have been watering 1/4 of the plot each night.  I have been putting 60 gallons a night for 2 weeks now.  I have first earlies and over wintering onions that seem to appreciate the water.  Is this over the top ?

Sounds like alot to me. But then it has been dry.

I've been soaking the lot for a week or so now every night aswell. But tonight I thought - hang on - lets check the soil. Under the surface it felt quite moist so I've not bothered tonight, except for the toms of course.

Actually, I might nip out in a moment and put some on the courgettes 

[skywalker]

I have no water on the plot and havent had chance to water all week now im really panicking 

[Flump]

 I feel very lucky having water troughs.I watered the spuds and the soil 'fizzed' as it was so dry!

[skywalker]

120 litres went on the plot tonight. 60 of that I had to take from home. Used two fermenting bins to get it there. wheew hard work. They will have to live with being watered once a week!

[Manlea1]

Im lucky,we have a mains tap on the outside of my fence on my plot,so just a case of connecting the hose pipe up and away i go 

[diggerjoe]

I was up at the plot last night watering trouble was so were loads of others and  as we were all using the water at the same time it took ages to fill a can so the potatoes got left out - didnt get home till 9 thinking of researching rain dances  

[prakash_mib]

I've implemented a nice little idea for filling the can quicker. I do have a mains at 50 feet and I place a rhino tub under it and let tap open to fill . Two watering cans filling each time. The tap is always on and the rhino gets refilled when I return to refill the cans.
The con side of it is you are really pushing your body to water continuously. I've reduced my watering time of 2 hours for my half a plot to 1 hour but feel like i've been to circuit training after I finish

[slow_worm]

Same here folks no appreciable amounts of rain since start of April 1st/2nd ...that's 3rd April in a row its been dry - no showers here!!  Got to do a little watering last night...only doing some once a week, haven't got much in anyway this year I will wait until we get the June monsoon!!  Then plant loads of French Beans for the freezer!

[noshed]

I just water the small seedlings. Everything else has to get on with growing roots. My soil is dark below about 2" so everything is doing OK.

[1jim]

same here in nottingham, new plot (only a few weeks old), no water on site yet, have been taking up 2 x 20L water containers full everytime I go up and puting in the water butt ready to be used, planted out a few things yesterday and watered in well but were bone dry by lunchtime today. Theres supposed to be some "longer than youd like showers" tomorrow so fingers crossed

[prakash_mib]

65 cans of water for half a plot. one hour of drenching. while coming back I was just calculating abit. Let us assume plants need a centimeter of rain a week (assumption).
my plot is 40*20 in feet. converting to meters and calculating the volume of water needed comes to 0.743 cu. meter which is equivalent to 743 litres of water.
cans can hold around 4 lires of water which equates to 260 litres of water. and probably I might be able to do one more stint during this week.
If mother nature fails to rain I will be impossible to to water when the plants are in full growth mode 

[mumofstig]

Prakash...........don't water the plot! just the plants that really need it 

[prakash_mib]

yep! top of the plot is what you can see beautiful lines (?) of plants, manicured herbs and all the stuff in beautiful arrangement. Under the ground there is a war going on for water waged by the roots of all the plants. 
Watering is to water the roots! not the plant! not the leaves! not the plot!