Most people who water, overwater. Stick your finger into the soil. If it comes out dry, you need to water. If you water more than 3 times a week, you are either growing the wrong plants for your zone or you are risking the loss of most of your plants during an extended drought.

Most of my garden is composed of exotic ornamentals and non-native plant material. I water two or three days a week and not at all if it rains.

Note: I am not from Florida and have not gardened there, but I have gardened over many areas of the US, including California, so I understand dry/hot places.

This particular year, I was watering about once a week during periods of more than a week without rain, but twice in previous years when hot dry winds blow.

The point is to adequately water the soil to wet several inches down, and encourage deeper root growth rather than a web of roots on the top from "sprinkling" them, thus encouraging them to resist drought and heat.

Most properly sited and adapted plants seldom need assists. I have watered 4 to 6 times this year so far, and in part of that watering is because I do have wetland plants like ferns, mimulus, lobelias, etc.

It has been a cool summer, but not a particularly wet one.

When it's summer rainy season the only plants I water are the ones in containers. If they droop in the afternoon I wait until the next morning, if still drooping I water them.

Could be yellow leaves from too much water. We've had rain every day for a month now and I have my sprinklers turned off, even though I have a rain sensor.

I agree with Katkin! I don't water at all during the rainy season (well except for potted plants under cover!)

It depends a whole lot on the type of dirt and the plants. Muck soils in low lying areas hold water and sure don't need extra this time of year. It is real easy to over water heavy soil. Those of us on sugar sand have more trouble with keeping soil moisture, even now. I have irrigation for part of the lawn, some of the flowers, and the garden. My target is one inch a week. Not hard to do in the rainy season, but winter crops need regular water. Most of my flowering plants are 'Florida Friendly' and drought resistant. They seldom get additional water.

Yellow leaves could mean you need to fertilize. The heat and sun take a toll on flowering plants and they need regular feeding.

Jane

The first consideration is how established are the plants. If they have been in the ground for at least two months they probably have established root systems and need little water.

When first planting I go on the 1, 2, 3 system. First week water every day. Second week, every other day. Third week, every three days. After that check to see if they are drooping.

The second consideration is your soil. As mentioned above if you have sandy soil, which most of us do, you will need to water more. It's difficult to water too much since much of the water simply drains away into the soil.

The third consideration is what plants do you have and where are they on your property. Most plants when established will need little-to-no extra watering in June, July and August because of the rainfall. However, some in full sun will still need help.

The suggestion above of deep watering is excellent in my opinion.

The soil composition and temperature influence how often I need to water. I generally have to water fast draining pots and raised beds everyday if there is no rain and temps over 80 degrees. The lawn and established bushes get rain or water 1-2 times a week.

I am in St Pete and the soil here is just sand.. I have most of the plants on an automatic drip irrigation system which i have go on daily during the hottest months of the year. I find daily watering is important for any small plant in full sun and any container in full sun. I normally go 2-3 days between watering in the cooler months...

I do have some plants off the drip system and water those by hand every couple of days this time a year. Most of those are plants that can handle dry conditions or some of the plants and containers in shade.

Agreeing about more frequent (& shorter) watering for sandy spots; no point in wasting water that will just drain away. It's been so dry here near the Gulf - raining inland but not here - so I move around a sprinkler & water for 15-25 minutes every other day or so & top off containers/pots daily.

Don't forget mulches - thickly spread, they should help keep silty, sandy 'soil' from becoming water-repellant.

I do use mulches.. and Saint Pete has some that is free if you haul it out. chopped up tree/yard waste that they row heat to destroy weeds and diseases. However, down here mulch just breaks down so fast. hard to keep up

hi
I agree with muscled, mulch breaks down so fact I can't keep up so i grow mostly in pots and mostly tropicals
since we've been averaging about a half inch a day i've had to repot a couple because they were drowing lol
I usually top layer canadian peat during winter but still must water frequently though not as often then when the rainy season returns I can just scrape it off
I also like the pots as I can't design a "bed" to save my necklol Within a week something needs to be moved and with pots no problem also allows me to group under trees ,palms and can just move them out of the way when necessary and have beds that you can't reach accross lol Also allows various water levels by grouping plants with similar needs. gary

garyfla , i also use a lot of pots.. and have been in the past 3 months moving more to them. I probably don't fertilize enough in the sand here, but i did an inadvertent experiment this sprint. I moved a struggling plant that was growing in the ground into a pot and forgot about ti. When I found it 6 weeks later, it has taken off. So i formalized the test, and dug some up and left some int he ground. In all cases the potted pants were healthy and growing and hte ones planted int eh ground were suffering.

I have found, that it is nice to have that ability to move things around. And being a renter with 400 plants, having them growing in pots will make the move to another house easier if we ever decide to do that.

"How often do u water your garden?
" I don't water it in a daily basis. Maybe every other day."

More important that how often is how MUCH you apply at every watering - are you watering long enough to get the soil wet all the way to the bottom of the roots?

The WORST thing you can do to most plants is to water them with small, frequent doses - their roots stay close to the surface and if there is an unusually hot day, the plants die.

Get a moisture meter ... stab it into the ground as far as possible at various places around the base of your plants and see how deep the moisture goes.

If no rain then twice a a week, at least.