Watering my veges question

[MsWildFlower]

We are in summer and the temperature is generally around 30 degrees celsius everyday. It last rained 12 days ago. No this is not a brag ... I have a genuine question!

How often should I be watering my vege garden? I have mulched with a thick layer of pea-straw and I don't see any signs of wilting, I did give the veges a quick splash about 5 days ago. I am waiting waiting waiting for my tomatoes to finally ripen and for so many other things to get their bum into gear and start producing that I am wondering if I should be watering them more often. Do you think they might be heat-stressed even though they are not showing signs of wilting?

The house is on town water supply but our garden taps are on a water tank.

Your comments please. Even without hi-temps, do you water regularly and if so how often?

TIA

[possum]

I am watering our vege patch about every day, it can survive every other day, but it shows

[Clara]

Sounds like a Spanish summer! We get those temps, but much less rain in summer, we can go months without - we water everyday, we can miss the odd day but I wouldn´t do that routinely. You obviously have good mulch, but periods of low water followed by lots can cause blossom end rot in toms.

[Millymollymandy]

It is very dependant on your soil type and how much muck or compost you have dug into it.

Example - we have sandy very free draining soil and the first year we had the veg patch there was no muck in it. We had to water every single day. Now there's 3 year's worth of horse muck and compost dug in and I hope I will only have to water about twice a week, apart from seeds that have just been sown, which do need watering every day.

[Jandra]

Can you feel under the mulch whether the soil is still moist? And how is moisture at 10 cm deep? If it is moist, you probably don't have to water. Tomatoes should do all right with a good drenching once a week, certainly if you've mulched. (the leaves don't like to say wet, by the way) But as mentioned before: it really depends on the quality of your soil!

In general it is better to give the garden an good drenching lesss often than a quick splash more often.

Good luck!

[MsWildFlower]

Thanks for the answers. I'll try and remember the 10cm deep moisture check. I LOVE pea straw, makes weeding so much easier and so much less watering!

[maggienetball]

Admittedly the temps in Torbay rarely reach, let alone stay at 30 so I don't know how much use my response will be.
On our allotments there is one gent who grows the best and biggest veg, year after year. Free from pest and disease and all organically.

Other than watering in to establish, he NEVER waters any of his plants. He says that the plants grow healthier and stronger and find their own water if they have to fend for themselves. The proof is there for all to see.

Water and damp encourages slugs and snails he says, which is why he doesn't get a slug problem.

He only mulches his beans. And he weeds regularly. His plot is beautiful. He grows tonnes of fruit too.

Even in our scorching summer a couple of years ago, he never watered once, and he won the local show cup with his allotment veg.

Lat year we set up a "Dry" bed as an experiment but it poured down all summer so we had a failed experiment.

I wonder what others think of a "no water" system?

[Macha]

Some of the old gardening books I've read say the same only water seed and newly transplanted things, and let the rest find their own water.

Though the way our weather is going I don't think we'll ever get a chance to try it out. Another summer like last year and we might try rice!

[Millymollymandy]

My English neighbour told me that her French neighbour doesn't water either. Waters just once when the veg are planted out (I'm not sure if they grow anything from seed or not) and that is that. I was amazed as we all have the same sandy soil - but as they've been there for decades perhaps his soil is fantastic by now!