WATERING THE GARDEN

Image Gallery Staff Photo (Better Bush Tomatoes Courtesy of Geo W. Park Seed Co.)

"Be sure to realize you are watering the soil, not the plant. "—John Jeavons

By Susan Glaese and MOTHER's staff

At this very moment, somewhere on our vast planet, it's raining. But at MOTHER's EcoVillage garden, we're in the middle of a typical summer dry spell . . . so I've been busy soaking the bases of our tomato plants with a watering wand. I feel that I'm doing my part to carry on a long and valuable tradition, because we humans have always intervened on behalf of our cultivated crops.

And throughout history, that aid has often involved drastic efforts—such as performing rain dances to the heavens, creating miles of hand-dug ditches, or hauling buckets of water great distances. Fortunately, watering a vegetable plot is much easier today than it was for our forebears. Most of us—with the twist of a spigot—can turn a garden hose into an umbilical cord linking us to vast (yet not inexhaustible) underground rivers. And since many of us don't need to worry about the availability of water, being blessed with adequate supplies, we can often afford, instead, to fret about when to water . . . how much moisture to put down . . . what implements and techniques are most appropriate to use . . . and how to conserve as much water as possible while still nurturing the crops.

These are the concerns we'll address in this article. But first, let's review some fundamentals about . . .

SOIL AND WATER

Water provides more than just liquid to a plant; it's also the medium that enables nutrients and minerals to enter the roots. (Roots don't digest dirt—they're not "woody earthworms"—but instead obtain their nutrients only in solution.) What's more, through the process of photosynthesis, some of water's hydrogen is split off to become a constituent of the carbohydrate compounds that make up most of the body tissue of growing plants.

Interestingly, water also enables plant roots to obtain nutrients that are beyond their physical reach. At varying depths below our feet lies the water table. Above that is soil containing minute, air-filled vestibules. When enough moisture surrounds each soil particle to create a continuous film from roots to water table, plants can, by capillary action, draw water and thus food from places far beneath their roots. (When this happens, the soil is said to have reached field capacity.)