Hi Jean - The biggest issue with people and putting stuff in their front yards comes down to something being an eyesore and decreasing property values - that is the only thing I can think of. It would be the same thing as someone not mowing their grass in weeks and it being a foot tall in their front yard in a neighborhood - or crap just thrown around the front yard with no respect to what it makes the neighborhood look like. Right now in the front yard I do not have the PVC "fencing" up that will hold the deer net around the gardening area. I will be putting that up soon when I plant the corn in the front yard. I'm actually surprised they have not got into the garden with the broccoli, peppers, and celery growing. I do have about 60 onions in the front - and deer do not like onions. Maybe this is keeping them away from the front where I have all of these items planted. The PVC fencing is what will make it look more like an eye sore than what it already is. But, my neighbors haven't said anything to me about it. In regards to videos, here is my YouTube Channel so you can see all of my videos that I've taken - wine making and information about the barrels. --- Organicislandfarmer - the water pressure works very well. I have not tried soaker hoses, but the irrigation works very well with the PVC pipe that I use. It does have its limits though - and it seems that I can get by with up to about 150 holes from one feed off the the 3/4-inch main pipe from the barrels. So in the front garden, I have about 120 holes total. Been working no problem with one feed from the line. I then have two other gardens - one behind the garage and the other next to the house. Originally I had all of these hooked to one feed amongst almost 300 holes. The pressure wasn't enough to do this. So I split it in half - about 150 holes each - and it is working well in this fashion. In regards to sprinklers - I highly doubt there would be enough pressure for what you would use it for. It will work, but you won't have near the range like you would if using tap. The other idea would be to get an in-line pump that could take the water from the barrels and pressurize it. Here is a link that might be useful: BsnTech Gardening Blog

Pretty good effort you made there. It is going to be real cool. Sort of reminds me of the space down the side of my restored Teahouse. I call that narrow strip the "allee" or walkway (guess that is where we got the English version alley.) A lot of landscaping books show ways to "force perspective" on such spaces, to distract folks from seeing how narrow they are, and also to make it feel longer than it is. They put the large leafed plants at the near end, or front, and gradually reach the small leafed plants down near the gate. And if I can find the picture of the way a gate is built to make it appear further and smaller, I'll post it for you. A "secret garden" gate at the end would be perfect. Then put your bistro table and two chairs back there. The space overhead created by the arbor could have a couple of hanging baskets. I heard you say the other day you were potting up baskets and such. Try about 4 of those in gradually reduced sizes as you reach the back. And, if you could possibly do so, make the path sort of undulate just a smidgen off of STRAIGHT, so you could place a large hosta as a feature and focal point as you are walking down the path. Or, a cluster of small hosta with a nie statue springing up out of their midst. Maybe hakone grass cascading there too. I love such found spaces. It makes me feel so good when I take an ignored space and make it something special. Our allee was a disaster and will be looking good shortly when I remove the leaf litter. I'll show this picture from last year, first year it was set up. Our privacy fence is to the south, the garage/Teahouse is on the left. I cut down the fence that was attached at the far end of the Teahouse, so we could walk completely around the building. To give a focal point, I situated the plain metal arbor on a center line with the stepping stone path, and set up Our Lady of Grace behind it. My passion vines grow on the arbor (Gulf fritillary butterfly host plant), and the big bananas behind the Blessed Virgin sort of screen off the neighbor and our chainlink fence. Love what you're doing, I get real excited about such projects. It is amazing how much difference it can make. BTW, I uploaded a few pictures of the space back there and it was really crude. I've always done my projects in "layers" instead of trying to make em perfect the first lick. That way, each layer improves the whole space, instead of just one small part, and you can modify the project as you see how it comes together well before the end result is visible. That's just the way I do things.

The ground has been dry under a few inches of surface moisture for a very long time and I think that's why I'm now seeing such an explosion of growth and bloom. After some time I will begin to study how much or little water the roses need, but at this point I think at least some of the roses have been short of sub-surface moisture for quite a long time and giving them more than necessary for a little while will not hurt them. Strangely, our water district actually has a surplus of water in its reservoirs because they've been importing water (don't ask!) so I don't feel that I'm causing any harm at this time, especially with El Nino coming soon. There will be quite a bit of fine tuning needed in the future to ensure we don't waste water but that the roses still receive the amount they require.

Your going to need something bigger and badder than the 4 zone thingy :-) Water bill shouldn't be a problem, because of the amount of rain Florida gets in the summer. Regular flow and pressure are usually enough for most homes , provided the system is divided up into the proper amount of zones ( valves). There are apps available which help you design a system. I think Home depot has one called- Orbit sprinkler design - or something like that. Once you have a design, you can determine how much of the work you can do yourself, and how much you want to contract out. You will probably want the controller and valves installed, and then the rest is pretty easy........mostly laying pipe in trenches, and installing the heads. You can save quite a bit of money, by renting a trencher , and doing the digging work your self. Large area sprinkler heads (gear driven rotors) can be pricey for name brands like Hunter, and Toro- but i have found that Orbit Voyager rotors are quite good for the money.