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By: Jack Greenwood
You know that watering your lawn is an important part of
lawn care but you have limited time to do it. Other than
hiring someone to do it for you, you can set up a portable
sprinkler to do the job for you.
A portable sprinkler is particularly useful if you have
a small lawn since it can be chore to move it around by
hand for a large lawn. If you live in an area with reasonable
amount of rainfall, the portable sprinkler can be use to
supplement rainfall when the occasional drought period arise.
You can shop for a portable sprinkler easily in any well-stocked
nursery or hardware store. Review the information on the
sprinkler box. It should indicate the size and shape of
the area it can cover.
There are many designs for portable sprinkler and you should
evaluate carefully which one will meet your needs. Some
models allow you to cover odd-shaped lawn while other may
have a tractor system that can move along the water hose.
After you purchase your portable sprinkler, you will want
to do a test to see how it performs. In particular you want
to know how much water it is using to cover your lawn. First,
place the portable sprinkler at the center of your lawn
and turn it on for about ten seconds. You want to know exactly
how much area it can cover. After ten seconds, turn the
portable sprinkler off and place about seven or eight empty
cups in the area covered by the portable sprinkler. Turn
on the portable sprinkler again and leave it running for
ten minutes.
After ten minutes, turn off the portable sprinkler and
check the amount of water for each cup. The amount in each
cup will vary, as portable sprinklers tend to have uneven
water distribution. However, the variation should not be
more than 0.25 inch. You will use the cup that has the least
amount of water for your estimation. Lets assume that there
is 0.2 inch of water in the cup with the least amount of
water. If you want to apply 0.5 inch of water, you will
have to leave the portable sprinkler running for 25 minutes.
A good hose is also vital for your portable sprinkler to
work efficiently. A good hose will roll up easily in any
weather and does not kink or crack. A cheap hose will give
you more maintenance headaches down the road as it tend
to kink and crack after using it for some times. You will
also waste precious water due to leakage from the cheap
hose.
It is also advisable to hook up a timer between your faucet
and your hose. You simply set up the timer and it will shut
off the sprinkler automatically after the set amount of
time has elapsed. This will prevent any wastage of water.
Once you have everything set up properly, you will want
to monitor the response of your lawn and adjust the water
application accordingly. The portable sprinkler may not
cover a few spots in your lawn and you will have to do the
watering manually for these spots. Nevertheless, with the
introduction of a portable sprinkler, the time you spent
watering your lawn will be dramatically reduced and you
can have more time to relax and do the things you want to
do.
About The Author
Jack Greenwood is the webmaster of GreenLawnCareTips.com
which provide information on lawn care and simple lawn watering
tips. Sign up for your free 7-part Green Lawn Care min-course
at http://greenlawncaretips.com today.
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