It’s very dry here. Lawns are dry. Cats and dogs are living together, total pandemonium.
Hydretain works really well, especially if you have watering restrictions, it can help you get through:
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Set up a watering plan:
https://youtu.be/k3mZ9l8MqTI
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Followers All right y'all welcome back to another Video now today we're going to actually Talk about watering the lawn and the dry Season and this is going to be mostly Aimed at those of you in Florida but I'm Assuming most of you in the Gulf States And over to Texas are having a dry Season at the same time as us you see Right now in the morning here my lawn Looks beautiful and Lush there's Dew all Over it so if I was leaving for work Right now I would think well the lawn is Properly watered however this time of Year this is our dry season in Florida We haven't had rain in several days We're actually very dry humidity is low And temperatures daytime are up over 85 Degrees and we are Cloud proof zero Clouds in the sky and what that does is About midday it really starts to take a Toll on the lawn and areas start to dry Out and what that does is it exposes Spots in your irrigation that are not Working right something's blocked Something needs to be taken care of so This is the time of year to get ahead of That because it's only going to continue To get more dry until our rainy season Kicks in in the summertime So you can see over here on this side of My lawn these areas here that are Turning this kind of Steely gray Brownish you can see over here even more
They're like shadowy looking throughout The gray or throughout the Green Lawn When you get a little bit closer down in There You'll notice that the grass blades They're like folded up even rolled up And what they're doing is they're Conserving water they're trying to not Get as much sunlight on them to hold Water because they don't have enough so This is a sign that you got an issue Going on in this spot here something's Not right the water isn't covering the Same there or whatever it is just let You know you need to do a little Detective work As opposed to over on this side of the Lawn you can see it is getting enough Water and so the grass blades are still Open but you will notice in some spots They're starting to fold up also here so This tells me overall I probably need a Little bit more water that spot on the Other side I really need more water this Area over here might need a little bit More water too so that's why we need to Make a few adjustments in our watering Strategies so you got to get ahead of Things now and start adjusting your Watering so that's what we're going to Do today we're going to just take a look At some areas that I need to adjust my Irrigation show you how I'm doing it and Hopefully this will help you in your
Lawn too okay so you can probably see This head right here it's squirting the House this is why we do this this is not Supposed to be happening I must have hit It with my mower or something so I mean These run at four in the morning I don't See it so this is one quick win right Here I need to adjust this head so it's Only going out into the lawn Okay so that was an easy fix I just had To adjust the pattern really simple now Though I'm going to show you some that Are actually blocked and we're going to Need to actually dig them out so they Work properly okay so now here's a head That is blocked by the grass itself the Grass is just grown up tall and around It and so it's obstructing so I need to Go ahead and dig this out and this is The problem you're going to find with Most of your heads this time of year is That they need to be completely dug out Let me show you how I do that all right Now what I want to do is go ahead and Dig it out and the first thing I'm going To use here is this I call it a donut Tool and I'll show you why it's called a Donut tool in a second but this is going To dig out the irrigation head fairly Well for us All right So you can see I have it dug out I'll go Ahead and pull the donut out here so you Can see but there's this donut
That surrounds every head it's just a Concrete donut and so what that does is It's supposed to help keep the grass From encroaching but it does anyway so That's why this tool is perfect see Because this tool fits right around the Donut right there and so that's how you Can dig it out Now there might be a time when this is Too low and we need to raise the head I Have videos that I've done on that That'll show you how to raise the head This one is probably close to being Needed to be raised but not quite yet so I've got it dug out here now I'm going To go ahead and I'm going to Edge out Around here just to free it up a little Bit more Foreign So here's an example of a head that's Almost completely blocked and this is Why you have to do this this is really Not very useful so this has probably Been like this for a while and it would Start showing in the lawn weak areas Because this is not getting watered Properly so it's super important to get In here and Get this cleared out Foreign Now that you've got all your heads Cleared and your coverage is good and You've raised any heads that you needed To now what we need to do is set up a
Watering plant and a watering plan for Warm season Turf this time of year is One and a half inches of water per week Now you don't want to get that all down In one single water and you actually Want to space it out into one half inch Three times a week so separate each Watering by a day or two and it's one Half inch every time now the way that You know how much or how long it takes For a half inch of water to go down is You take the tuna can challenge you see A lot of people say well I water every Day for an hour I water every day for Two hours well that doesn't tell me Anything because we have multiple zones Here your watering is different than Mine your water pressure is different Than mine so what you have to do is Understand how long it takes to put down A half inch of water and you do that by Throwing these tuna cans out in the yard And letting them go and when you get a Half inch of water in there you know That's how long it takes each Zone to Produce that half inch I'll give you a Link below to a comprehensive video I Did that shows you how to do that but That's the next thing you do get done One and a half inches water per week and You take the tuna can challenge to set Up that watering in now let's go to the Final step for helping our Lawns through This dry period okay the last thing
We're going to do is we're going to Apply hydrotain hydrotain is going to Basically help the watering that you do Do go further or if you have to go on Vacation it'll help you if you miss Watering stuff like that it basically Takes all the available water and brings It right to the root Zone but it's very Important that it gets watered in and so Really what you want to do is you want To put down just water only first now I Happen to have a whole lot of dew on the Ground here because it's still morning So that's perfect but if you don't have Dew on the ground turn it to the water Only setting first and give your grass Just a quick once over and get it nice And wet the reason is is we don't want This product to dry on the leaves at all We want this in the soil and so it helps If the grass is already a little bit wet Like I said I have Dew here so that's Going to count for that so we've got Water on it first now I'm going to go Ahead and turn on the hydrotain and We're just going to get it down now this Cork can cover up to 5000 square feet And uh you know just kind of get it in There just like any other application You do this isn't going to burn anything This isn't going to change the color of The lawn this is a moisture manager And we just want to get this down and Then immediately upon getting it down
We're going to water it in we do not Want this to dry on the leaves of the Grass we need this one in the soil And this application will last a good Three months what happens is a lot of You all come from up North and you're Used to your cool season lawn checking Out in the summer and so you use Hydrotain all summer but here in Florida Our rainy season is Summer right now is The dry season as I mentioned and so This is really the time when we need Hydrotain here in Florida and again I'm Assuming it's very similar on the Gulf Coast of Texas Louisiana Alabama Mississippi Hope I didn't miss any Gulf States So that's it get that hydrotain down Real nice All right I got this 2500 square foot Section done you see I have some left Because I'm gonna go put the rest on There but I'm gonna go to the water only Setting now and I'm going to go back and Just get a nice light watering of it in And then I'm going to turn my irrigation On right after that especially because All my heads are all nice and clear Right now I'm gonna go ahead and do the best I can On water only just to get this watered In Get it started It's expensive products so you want to
Make sure you do this right take the Extra time to do all this extra little Bit of watering doesn't take that much Time but it's really important All right I'm all finished getting the Hydrotain down now I gotta go ahead and Turn on my irrigation And get it watered in and that's kind of It now you just got to kind of watch how Does your lawn come out as you have Fixed this do you have dry spots do you Have brown areas areas that are checking Out if you do chances are you might have Another sprinkler head blocked or if you Check and it's not that then you can Rule out watering as a problem if you See a brown spot and start doing a Little more detective work down the road But getting the watering plan set in Stone first getting everything going is The first step during this dry season so If you have any questions leave those in The comments below as always thank you So much for watching I'm Alan handle Lawn Care nut and I'll see you in the Long Foreign
