If you recall, for the last several weeks we've discussed the planning for a prepper garden. And so we come to the last installment (at least until we can get a garden actually in the ground).
So far on our hypothetical large suburban lot, we've:
- located a 100x100 foot garden spot with good southern solar exposure
- sub-divided the plot to only start with a 25x25 foot area (for our first gardening foray)
- laid out (at least on paper) our bedding plan
- decided on raised beds, either mounded or contained; if going for contained, we've either purchased or scrounged materials for the bed frames
- located sources of aged manure and/or sand to amend our on-site soil (if needed)
Yep. We got it all together. And if you're like me, you're already wading through the snow with survey sticks and string in hand.
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Now it's time to consider the final part of our WWF (water, warmth and fertilizer) mnemonic: water.
Remember that oft-quoted and inexact human survival saying: "Three minutes of air, three days of water and three weeks of food"? Well, we can avoid worrying about the garden entirely if all the oxygen is suddenly stripped from the earth. But no matter how pretty your garden layout looks, without water nothing will grow.
"No worries," you say. After all, you've got municipal water that comes right out of the tap, and you wisely placed your garden plot right next to one of those taps. Smart move! (Oh wait ... I told you to do that. Well, congratulations on having the foresight to take such expert instruction.) Or maybe you have some other water sources, like a consistent weekly rainfall (Hawaii must be nice this time of year) or a river, lake or irrigation ditch adjacent to your place (for which you have water rights), or a well.
All these options will insure you a steady and dependable water supply for your thirsty plants … unless your power goes out for a protracted period of time (excluding Hawaii.). With the loss of power comes an end to pumps. And when the pumps stop, moving water becomes problematic.
And you must have water. Most authorities say you need a least one inch of water per week to keep plants alive and growing. What a lot of those online sources don't say is that minimum jumps up pretty quickly with the temperature. In fact, for every 10oF increase over 60oF, you need to add an additional half-inch of water. So if your average daily (24 hour) air temperature is 80oF, you'll need to add an extra inch or more of water per week. (Some broad guidelines can be found here.)
How much water does that inch represent over a 25x25 foot garden?
Well, I'll save you the calculation. You'd need about 390 gallons to cover your garden with one inch of water. But that figure includes all the walkways between beds, and we don't need or want to waste water there. As we previously figured out, our usable garden space is actually about 252 square feet, so we'd need around 157 gallons a week to adequately water our beds at 60oF average temperature.
Just to make it clear, because some folks are too literal (I don't mean you, of course; it's that guy over there), you can't just go out every Friday and dump 157 gallons of water on your garden and expect great things, plant-wise. That water needs to be delivered throughout the week. Sorry.
So what can you, as a prepper, do about the potential loss of power-provided water? You recall the survivalist maxim ("Three is two, two is one and one is none") and you come up with other ways to keep your garden watered (and maybe bolster your own water security as well).
The first way is to further lower your water needs. Water delivered quickly over a large area is very prone to evaporation and waste by not being where the plants can get to it – so avoid sprinklers. Hand watering is better, but only if you have the discipline to stand there in the hot sun.
Better still is the use of drip irrigation (it's all I use.). Done correctly, you can reduce your garden water needs by 30 to 50 percent. Drip systems are surprisingly inexpensive; and with a little thought, can save you oodles of time. A quick look at the concept can be found here.
Mulching a garden is another major water saver. A thick layer of a non-germinating water-permeable media like very clean (no grass seed remaining) straw or old pine needles can retard evaporation, block weeds, slowly add nutrients to your soil, and limit water-splash transmitted diseases on your plants. Combined with a drip system, this can seriously lower your water input.
But what do you do if there's no water coming from the tap? Well, you pre-plan. Got a shallow well or a border stream? Pure gravy. No well, no stream, no weekly rain?
Store some.
According to the U.S. census, the average U.S. square footage for a home is 2400 square feet, which means a roof just as big or bigger. If you can capture even a portion of the rain that falls on that roof, you'll have enough to handle your garden with water to spare. Here's an example:
In Oregon, the average annual rainfall is about 30 inches (much higher in the west, much lower in the east). That's about the national average. Now let's say we can capture just 10 inches of that total from roof runoff. That comes out to about 15,000 gallons. At 157 gallons a week, that means you can water your garden for 95 weeks, and that's without using a drip system or mulch.
Of course, this is crazy talk. Not many of us have a spare 15,000-gallon tank sitting around. But do you have, or can you get, one of those above-ground swimming pools? The average 21-foot round pool with a depth of 48 inches holds 13,500 gallons of water. A 21-foot round pool with a depth of 52 inches holds 14,500 gallons. And don't forget that pool will collect another 2200 gallons of water all by itself with just 10 inches of annual precipitation.
Alternately, you can hit a farm auction and find a 1500-gallon tank for cheap. One of those will contain enough water to handle your garden needs for two months (and you can recharge it each time it rains during those months). Just make sure if you buy one pre-owned, it wasn't used for pesticide containment.
Before you start setting up the kiddie pool, check your state regulations for rainwater capture. Some states allow it, some don't, and some limit it. For example Colorado limits you to two rain barrels' worth (110 gallons) at any one time. In Oregon, you can capture rainwater, but only from roofs, so putting out tarps to direct water to an underground cistern is a no-go.
Finally, let's talk about how to move that water if the lights are out. If you've got a generator and lots of fuel and aren't concerned about attracting the wrong kind attention from the noise, you can get an electric pump. But if you're like me, you'll want to minimize the "Come and eat me" racket. You should plan ahead by getting hand or pedal-powered pumps or – for the more techie types – a solar panel and a quiet electrical pump.
Or, in the end, you can feed your thirsty plants the Navaho way: one gourd dipper at a time. Because if things get that bad, your garden will be the most important thing in the world.
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