cbezak

Hi, I seem to be stressing so much about wether to water or not, and if so HOW MUCH??? Would a moisture meter help?

Carla

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2woodensticks

i use one on all of my plants..small portable stick it in and go..i prefer to give the right amount,why waste it..not to much i think is far better than way to much

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got to love em..{neotropical rattlesnake..cascabell}

RGrandall

cbezak, the answer to your question depends entirely upon the type of meter that you use.

There are many mixed feelings about meters, many bad, but that is primarily because most people try out the cheapo meters you get at places like home depot. Most of these cheap meters don't work as expected, often giving inaccurate and false readings, which in turn causes much frustration for the user. There are a couple of reasons that these meters don't work. The first is that many of them are not insulated, and thus corrode very quickly, leading to false readings. The other reason they don't work is that many are affected by salinity (i.e. fertilizer). Essentially, if you place a meter in soil with high salinity, it will give a "wetter" reading, even if the soil is bone dry.

Having gone through my fair share of meters, I too became very frustrated, and finally decided to try this soil moisture meter. Although it is a little more expensive, it is fully insulated, hasn't corroded, and isn't affected by salinity - all in all, ive been pleased with it for the 3 years i've had it.

If you don't want to put down money for ANOTHER meter, you have a couple of options. If you already have a meter that corroded, you can rub off the corrosion with a piece of steel wool as a temporary fix. I don't know any solution to the salinity issue though.

The last option would be to just use what you have: your body. You can simply stick your finger in the soil, and if it comes up dry, water (duh). You can also kick the pot every once in a while, and eventually get a feel for how heavy it is with, and without water.

Anyways, saw that your post didn't really get a whole lot of feedback, and thought I might give my 2 cents.

Hope this helped!

Nicolas Naranja

You can get a decent tensiometer for not much money and basically irrigate at -10 kPa.

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Some people go bananas, I went plantains.

beam2050

it's not winter yet but I believe my meter basically works more for the dry side. I am going to get a better one, one that might work more on the wet side, pay a little more money. any ideas?

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npk of wood ash 0/1/3 to 0/3/7

npk of banana leaf ash 1.75/0.75/0.5