When the Rain Barrels are Empty, It's Better Than a Hose

There are inevitable compromises.  I would prefer a garden that stands free and unfettered, diligently if inelegantly carved from the prairie.  Nibbling rabbits and grazing deer, however, necessitate a fence if we are to harvest anything at all.

I would prefer that the emerging stems and spreading leaves simply have the freedom to grow unmolested.  Last year's holocaust wrought by invading beetles, aphids and miscellaneous worms convinced me that some defensive, albeit organic, measures were in order.  

I would prefer to simply cut the soil and sow the seeds and let nature do the rest.  Heat and drought and unpredictable rains, however, mean some hose time is inevitable.  The rain barrels, after all, can only hold so much. Last year that "only so much" was exhausted in a matter of days, meaning the hose and I got very well acquainted -- a hundred feet of it plus a spray nozzle, row by row by 40-something rows.  This year, then, I compromised yet again.  Surely there is nothing particularly salvific about standing there for hours holding a hose and guiding a spray.  Surely my time could be better and more productively spent if water could be delivered a more automatic, less mind-numbing way.  I could do something else...like weed or...perhaps even read...or write.

This spring, then, with the kind assistance of a patient retailer who listened to my description of what I thought I wanted and morphed it into what he could tell I actually needed, I became the proud owner of a drip irrigation kit.  Consistent -- even excessive -- rainfall gave me permission to avoid opening the box (these sorts of mechanical forays not being my forte) until recent days.  To my surprise and relief, assembly and installation turned out to be simple...and successful.  This, with only minor grimacing, jabs into that, with the strip of the drip tape rolled out into the trenches and tied off at the ends.  As of today, both sides of the garden are outfitted and, with a simple quick-release of the hose to shift between the two, the entirety can be effortlessly slaked while I go about my business.

There is, of course, yet another compromise.  All this tubing laying around makes it precarious to mow between the trenches.  Alas, nothing is completely easy.

This is, after all, a garden.