I only use burlap as a weed guard that will decompose in a year.

don't see why couldn't use something like window screen (comes in metal and plastic) or some fine mesh metal hardware cloth.

I was thinking of that! I know screen comes in fiberglass... I was going to use hardware cloth to support the weed barrier but I will definitely look into screen types and maybe still use hardware cloth to help keep it from ripping.

Thank you!

Apparently fiberglass is made with plastic, so scratch that. But I'll try some super-fine metal screen and see how much soil passes through.... even if some soil leaks, it would be worth it!

This is on another thread, but I can not remember where.

https://gardenmats.com/products/garden-mats/

I am going to try them this year, I think they are safe.

If you use PVC pipe &/or water hose, then you are as safe as any plastic mulch.

If you drive a gasoline car with rubber wheels, have asphalt shingles, then why over react about weed covering.

Do you have your heart set on the sub-irrigated concept? It seems to me that it would be easier to just use hoses/tubes and a water timer. I realize that's not the point, but I'm befuddled about the whole idea.

I will have more beds than hoses.... My plan is 10 raised beds. So if I can fill them all up and not have to worry for a week it'll make my life a lot easier. Does that explain it? Or am I missing something?

I've also used soaker hoses and timers a lot in the past and the timers always break.... Probably because I got the cheap ones

https://www.dripworks.com/

This is what my Brother in law use on has 3 acre fruit & vegetable fram.

That & SS is his only income.

He eats very well.

I am going to try them this year.

Dogcatlady, I suppose I get what you're doing, but it seems like much more work and expense than setting up irrigation and buying a higher quality timer. Some cheap half-inch tubing, some fittings, and some drip tube seem like they'd work.

My garden is roughly 70X70, divided into twelve rows, six feet center to center. We have an electric watering timer connected to an electric valve connected to a PVC "spine" going down perpendicular to the twelve rows. The spine has twelve tees, one for each row. Each tee leads to a 70-foot length of half-inch plastic tubing (the cheap stuff-not garden hose) serving as the watering "spine" down the row. Then we insert the various fittings for each bed into (ten beds per row, 120 beds total) into the half-inch tubing.

(Actually, I'm lying a little bit. Some rows don't have a length of tubing in their tee. Row 3 used Row 5's tubing last year, because Row 5 was dryfarmed. But what I describe is the design, and enough of it is installed that I can assert that it works.)

If I instead had just ten beds, I'd do a smaller version of the same thing:

- Hook a hose to the spigot.

- Hook a cheap battery-powered timer to the hose. (We have one of these at another part of the house, and so far it's lasted about three years.)

- Make an ugly assemblage of tubing, at least half-inch tubing, that gives me a tube for each of the ten beds, each one long enough to reach the bed. Attach it to the other end of the timer.

- Hook my other stuff--maybe sprinklers, maybe drippers--to the tube for each bed.

- Program the timers, turn on the water, and flee!

That all seems like less work than your plan. Now, one issue is water pressure--it'll be hard to tell whether you can get enough pressure for all ten beds simultaneously without trying it. But if you can't, you could disassemble the ten-arm thing and make two five-arm things, hook them up to two timers, and have them go off at different times, so that you're only watering five beds at a time. Basically, you could create the assemblage, add one bed after another to it, and build a new one as soon as the water pressure falls.

I'm not the boss of you. :) But that's my suggestion.

Returning to add: But I do use weed cloth--on top of the soil. I lift it between crops, amend the soil, and put it back. The automated watering and weed cloth is intended to make the garden as low-mainenance as humanly possible.

I think I will do something like this for my fruit trees and berry bushes (not yet planted.) I definitely wonder about water pressure for 10 vegetable beds though..but you're saying I could set up 2, 3, 4 sections and have them watered at different times? I have to think about this. Honestly it looks overwhelming to me, but I trust your opinions that it's not! The sub irrigation planters seem really basic to me ****because I used "Grow Boxes" http://www.agardenpatch.com/ last year and they are super easy to deal with, and if I have big SIPs, I can just weed while they fill up.

Lots to think about...and I need to make decisions fast! :( I can't plant the beds until I decide....

Thanks so much for the suggestions and support!!!

I am, of course, largely ignoring the fact that what's easy for me may be quite different from what's easy for you. The irrigation seems far easier to me than the wicking beds--especially considering that even with the wicking beds, you have to get out there and drag hoses around and stand there running water, just less often, while with the valves you just need to stroll out once in a while to make sure they're running.

But it sounds like the opposite is true for your perception of easy/not easy. So while I of course think I'm right, I could (Gulp. Noooo!) be wrong.

LOL! It really does sound easy when you describe it that way! But I was also planning to try "lasagne gardening" (http://www.motherearthnews.com/organic-gardening/lasagna-gardening-zmaz99amztak) which would require moving all the lines around at least yearly. Have you had to move them much? I have to wonder if the connections would become damaged.

The more I think about it the more I think both methods are so much better than sprinklers and individual soaker hoses (one per area) which is what I have done in the past, it's going to be so much easier than before!!

I am not done thinking, but I'm leaning toward my original plan. That plan gets more weight just because if I switch to irrigation, and if something goes wrong, I'll be upset with myself for switching gears days before implementation. I am not in any way discounting your suggestions! But the way I plan to make drains in my tanks, I actually could switch things around if I'm not happy with how it's going, so that's the back-up plan!!

But I do think that's by far the best option for my trees larger berry plants (the strawberries are going in tubs.) They will be scattered across my 1 acre and I definitely don't want to drag hoses allover for them. In the past I have used something like this http://www.amleo.com/soaker-hose-drip-irrigation-tree-ring/p/SR6/?kc=amlshop17n,&mkwid=s49BstyOo|dc&pcrid=51228669112&pkw=&pmt=&plc=&prd=SR6&gclid=Cj0KEQjwrYbIBRCgnY-OluOk89EBEiQAZER58mE5zEL_Czg7OhFjEkazxx4WjkeXxcrzBw-oCN3I2wYaAqDb8P8HAQ ---I had them connected in series, and the uphill plants got a lot more water than the downhill trees.

Anyway, I"m still thinking (24 hrs a day) about this, but will need to act soon! I really do appreciate your thoughts---I just wish this conversation had started 2 months ago so I could be more sure of my decision, one way or the other.....

Ann

Yep; every time I replant a bed, I move the lines for that bed aside, lift the fabric, putter with the soil, replace the fabric, and replace the lines. Well, almost every time; I was recently looking at the bed where the lettuce failed and debating whether it needs refreshing or whether I should just plug some beans in there.

To give more detail of how the irrigation is supposed to be in my garden, and how most of it (increasing every year) is:

The rows are six feet center to center. The middle four feet are planting area, and then there's a two foot path between rows. The path is permanently covered with weed cloth. The half-inch plastic tubing watering "spine" runs down one side of the path. I don't need to move that, because it's on permanent path.

Then for each area I want to water, I poke a hole in the half-inch tubing and insert a length of quarter-inch tubing with a barb, usually making a point of having several inches of extra slack. Then I attach whatever watering apparatus is appropriate, to that quarter-inch tubing. Then I position that in the bed, usually nailing it down with some ground staples.

For the "whatever watering apparatus", I've traditionally created all sorts of horrible squid-like things, this one intended for four beds, this one intended for two, this one with an extra line crossing the path because I forgot to add a line for that tomato, etc,, etc. Then at the end of the year I have a bunch of spare parts and lengths of tubing that are a pain to rebuild into something else next year.

So I'm trying to get systematic now and have just three or four different configurations, all of them designed to water exactly one bed. That way, if I add that little extra length to the tubing going to the spine, I can just cut off the different apparatuses... (apparati?) and swap them from bed to bed each year. Each swap would cost me about an inch of tubing; hence the mentioned slack. And I want to have a little quarter-inch manual valve on that quarter-inch takeoff for EVERY bed, so that I can withhold water from the potatoes while still watering the onions.

So for your raised beds I could imagine:

- A simiar half-inch plastic spine, permanently nailed down OUTSIDE your raised beds. You might have just one spine, or you might have two, each one serving five beds, or three, each one serving three plus one taking on an extra...

- For each bed, a length of quarter-inch plastic tubing long enough to reach into the bed, with some slack for future changes.

- For each bed, a watering assemblage attached to the end of that length of tubing.

Actually, you could go with a hybrid: Build your original wicking beds, but still set up the "spine" and use it to refill your water reservoirs. If it doesn't work, you've only wasted a little plastic tubing; if it does, then you could go on to the battery-powered timer to refill the reservoirs; if that works, then you've had a taste of automated watering and you can decide whether you like it.

Thinking about the question of uphill, downhill, and soaker hoses: That sounds like you had a pressure issue. My experience--though I may have been misinterpreting the situation--is that soaker hoses seem to drain a LOT of pressure out of a system. I can run drippers for what feels like miles and miles, but not soakers.

That doesn't mean that I don't use soakers, but I use them in fairly short lengths and I don't use the big soaker hose. For example, when i wanted to water 72 linear feet with quarter-inch soakers (four beds, each with three six-foot-long "drills"), I ended up breaking the job up into four groups of three six-foot lengths.

(Recipe: Half-inch plastic spine. Quarter inch plastic hose plugged into half inch spine with barb. Three tees in quarter inch hose, each one placed precisely where the soaker needed to start. Six foot of quarter inch soaker hose on each tee. Soaker hose kinked AND goof plugged at the end. This soaker-hose-for-three-six-foot-drills is one of the "standard" watering apparati that I mention above.)

On the other hand, for a large area you might need to go with drippers or something else that gulps less pressure than a soaker hose.

Edited to add: Oh! Soakers in series? Yeah, that will lose your pressure really fast. Try solid tubing and only tee to the soakers right where you need them.