Thursday, July 2, 2009

The Zen of Watering by Hand


I water my garden by hand. I like to do it that way. It requires patience and being in the moment to do it properly. No twittering or playing lexulous on my iphone while i'm caring for my precious friends. I like that the robin (the bird not my wife) follows me around pulling worms out of the moist ground. I noticed the first signs of borers in the delicata squash vines in time to take care of them before it was too late. There sure are a lot of spiders scurrying around. They remind of the children's song about the intsy weentsy spider going up the water spout.
I saw a bunch of welsh onion seedlings that volunteered to grow in the swale beside their mother's bed. They germinated there after i watered last week. Now i'm thinking i might grow those onions on the edge of the bed so i'll have space to grow something else in the bed they occupy now.
This train of thought would never have occurred had i not been watering by hand.

2 comments:

spotted face said...

Excellent reasons to water by hand. I think that is part of the appeal of gardening - paying attention to the Earth. That's the way I water also.

San Diego Farmgirl said...

I'm a hand-waterer, too! However, we get that squash leaf fungus from tap water, so I really should install a drip system for those.

Say, regarding the tomato-eating varmint: a friend suggested plastic, shiny kids' pinwheels from Wal-Mart or ToysRUs or wherever. Usually 99 cents each, plus they might have 4th of July themed ones on sale. She said just shove them into the ground, and not only will they scare away squirrels and raccoons, the gophers don't like the vibration. Bonus!