It is my understanding that soaker hoses are not designed to hook up that many to one water source; the problem would be maintaining good pressure.

To take care of this problem we are putting in water lines to various areas of our garden so we can connect soaker hoses to the faucet in each bed.

Yesterday we finished filling/planting the 80'x 2 1/2' blackberry, strawberry, blueberry bed...my soaker hose for that bed is 75'. This morning we hurried and built a 3'x 32' bed...will fill it later with asparagus seedlings that are ready to go out and plant corn...have a front coming in with lots of wind and possible freeze next two nights.

Peggy

You might try running 3/4" or 1" (preferred) PVC to the garden instead of running the hose. That should help quite a bit. Also, use the PVC to create a header instead of connecting all of the soaker hoses together. You'll get much better flow. I do this to water my garden which is about 5000 sq ft and it works fine for drip and T Tape. If you want to switch to T Tape or drip you'll also need a pressure reducer as part of the header.
Rick

You can try hooking up a manifold to your central feeder, that way you can run zones at different times. Cheapest option is a manual manifold that you would have to switch on and off, while a more expensive but convenient method would be an automated manifold that you could schedule. For instance, divide your garden up into four zones (250 sq. ft each) and each zone would be scheduled to run for 45-60 mins. Leads to longer overall watering time, but it should solve the pressure problem.

We use 100's of feet of soaker home in our large gardens with no problems at all - overhead sprinklers just promote more foliage diseases and waste water.

But as already mentioned, soaker hose are not intended to be used as one long run of hose. Depending on the diameter of the soaker hose 100' runs is about max for efficiency. Depending on the layout of your garden, 50' runs work even better.
/-------------------
W-----Y/-------------------
/ -------------------

Y connectors or multi-head 3 or 4 way connectors used to set-up various zones in the garden solve the problems of too little or too much water to various areas. Not all plants need the same amount of water nor as frequent anyway.

Dave

Here is a link that might be useful: Lots of previous discussions on using soaker hoses correctly

M Lorne--what is a manifold? Is that a plumbing fixture that I could find at Ace Hardware. Does it have like 4 connectors and is it programmed to run at different times or must i manually connect & change soakers, etc. pls tell me more about this mechanism so I can explain it to my husband.

Dave--what is a 4 way connector? Does that go onto the main hose? Then I could only water with 4 hoses at a time right? Sounds like I have to walk back there and disconnect 4 and connect the next 4?

My main hose spigot has a timer on it becuase I tried to find the simplest way to water without having to walk back 250 feet just to move hoses and reconnect and turn stuff on and on all morning long.

FYI I have 35 foot rows with a central path. Is there hope for an automated way to water for me?

Looking forward to knowing more........Thx for the great info.

A hose manifold has one hose input and multiple hose outlets. The outlets are switchable on or off so you can divert water to the area of your choice. A "4-way" would have 4 outputs. I have seen electronic models that are programmable, but I've never used one.

Need to spend a bit of time exploring a hardware store, huh? ;)

Yes, you can buy manifords with any number of outlets. One input and 2 or 3 or 4 or 6 outlets. But instead of hooking the manifold to the house where the hose starts, you simple screw it on to the end of the hose once it gets to the garden and then run your soaker hoses from the outputs on it. Picture of a 4 way linked below.

How many rows do you have? If 4 then 1 for-way is all youd need. If 8, then you put a Y connector on the house faucet and run 2 hoses to the garden with 1 manifold off each hose.

If 35' rows then 1 run of 70' soaker can do 2 rows or if the rows are fairly close then just 1 35' run down the aisle between the rows works. Lots of possible set-ups.

But I have to say that I assume you understand that unmonitored automated watering has some real drawbacks for the plants. How do you adjust for the different needs of different plants? How do you measure the amount of water that they are getting? How do you compute the amount of time the hose has to be on? How do you adjust for rainfall that week? How do you check soil moisture levels to know if watering is even needed at the set time? Are your beds mulched and is the soaker hose positioned under the mulch as needed?

Over-watering causes more problems for most garden plants than under-watering does and automated watering often only makes the problems worse.

Dave

Here is a link that might be useful: 4 way hose manifold

Oh Dave we havent had any overwatering issues, only under watering here. The first year went great because I had thinner rows but now with my 3 and 4 feet wide rows, I've had to buy more hosing and that's where I ran into a prob with the pressure. When it rains I dont water.

I found a 5 outlet manifold at AceHardware.com. My rows arent the same width on either side of my garden (path runs down middle) but on my schematic I counted 10 times I will have to run a hose from side to side right through the path onto the other bed on other side. Sure wish all my hose lengths were the same too but that's not the case.

We will need to get some more closures for the ends of some of them. It wont be perfect and my husband understands what he must do to help me lay the hoses.

This is great. Today I took the huge hunk of hosing that are all connected from the top shelf. They were stored by the gardener for the winter, still all connected in one long snake. I unscrewed them and looked at the lengths then looked at my schematic trying to see what length will cover which beds, etc. and how the extra will run into the next bed, etc. Tried to visualize the manifold in the center left with 5 hoses coming off it.

I cant see if I will a 4 outlet or 5 outlet but with a 5 I'll be safe.

I noted that I could use a Y and another 250 ft rubber hose back to the site if the 5-manifold doesnt work with single hose. However if this 5-manifold fails, I have another spigot on opposite side of home, I could always run another 250 ft hose from that side. Trying to minimize costs is all, I'll try one thing at a time.

Soaker hoses are a bit expensive for someone who has graduated to the larger garden size. Aside from that they will maybe work well for a few years and then they become sporadic in their output. I'd suggest you forget the hardware store but ask at a few nurseries wher the nearest irrigation supply center is. I agree with Macheske in that T-Tape is the most efficient way to go. Instead of relying on an expensive manifold system run a hose line to a header of layflat tubing. Then you can punch holes into that to connect the T-Tape drip lines, a dozen is fine since you only want 10 lb. pressure max. Space your T-Tape right on your rows for maximum water efficiency or between rows that are less than 10 inches apart.

Marial,
I can tell you what I did if that would help some.

1. I ran a PVC line out to my garden from my house plumbing. This was very easy for me since I have a tractor and just used a subsoiler to dig a trench. Good thing since the garden is a long way from the house. At the house end I attached a vacuum breaker and at the garden end I attached a pressure reducer and a main ball valve. It's nice this way since the line is underground.
2. After the pressure reducer I ran PVC above ground to the end of the rows. At each row (in most cases) I attached a ball valve and have a threaded connector for a T-Tape fitting or a flush connector for a drip line. This way I can turn on or off the water to each row.
3. The rows with plants that are close together like strawberries, beans, corn, herbs, etc. get T-tape and the ones with large plants like tomatoes, squash, melons, grapes, etc. get drip.

When I need to water my plants I can either turn it on in the house or go out to the garden and do it there and control the water more precisely. Most times I just need to turn on the water from the house. This system can very effeciently water my ~5000 sq ft garden and took me about 6 hours to put in. I do spend about 2 hours in the spring putting everything in the garden back in since I remove it for the winter and blow out the lines with a air compressor.

Hopefully this help some.
Rick

Oh...here is a picture from last year. I made some changes since then.

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