How much do you water your fruit trees? Last year, I watered about 15 gal a week and had several trees die. Gone to 30 gal a week. Takes me about five hours if I stay with it. Temps here are near 100 or sometimes over. 1/2” rain in a month. Another month of hot weather. How much do you water your trees?
How Much To Water Fruit Trees?
- Thread starter SwampCat
- Start date
Turkey Creek
5 year old buck +
Going to depend on soil type, age of the tree and root stock. Here in my local area I feel like an 1" of rain or equivalent of irrigation is sufficient on most soils over the root zone. Water once a week, light watering only promotes shallow rooting. Less is needed on mature trees, especially if they are not carrying a crop.
None have a crop - coons see to that. I watered half that much last year and lost several 3/4 yr old trees. Couple years ago, had some ten yr old dunstan chestnuts and only gave them 5 gal a week and they both died
b116757
5 year old buck +
1” a week I believe is recommended also I don’t really do that with my large plantings last year I’d try and get out there once a week or maybe every two weeks and hit the fruit trees with couple seconds of water from a 2” hose from 400 gallon water buffalo this is likely about 5 gallons or so of water. This year I haven’t watered at all so far but we been getting a little rain here and there. The oak trees are pretty much sink or swim they either live or die but they will receive no water from me just to many of them to fool with watering. My soil is silty clay and likely holds water pretty well.
FarmerDan
5 year old buck +
Let's assume the goal is to provide the equivalent of 1" of rain to the tree root mass which covers the area under the crown of the tree. Further, the area is circular. The area of a circle is 3.1416*radius squared. Divided the result by 43,560 to get the acre equivalent and multiply by 27,154.
A tree with an 8ft dia crown needs 31 gallons of water to make the 1-acre-inch of precip. A 4 ft crown, 8 gallons.
This assumes the water says in the area of the crown. If it does, next question is how deep? How deep does it need to go to supply the entire root system? I don't know about the tree's root system depth but research shows, on average, one-inch of rain penetrates 30-inches of sandy soil and as little as one or two inches of heavy clay.
Considering all the factors, getting enough water to trees on an individual basis is a daunting task.
Last edited:
Teeder
5 year old buck +
I sometimes water when I plant and that's it, but it is different for every location. We generally don't have drought issues here.
Most of them - the ones that died last year did
Have you tried amending the soil with something like Soilmoist?
bigboreblr
5 year old buck +
Water when you can. I put a bucket outside and let it fill with rain. IF the bucket is empty for 3 days, I water. After mid august I water less often if at all. I helped the tree survive the first bulk of the summer.
I dig deep when I plant my trees. I ammend with peat moss and some lighter potting soil for my heavy clay soil at home. At camp, its sandy soil. I bring clay soil from home and heavier raised bed soil from the sotre. Mulch plenty too. Atleast a bag per tree. I also collect leaf mulch and concentrate it around the tree.
I water about 7-8 gallons a tree. I have 5 gallon water jugs with a 14" hole drilled in the bottom. They take about 10 minutes to drain out Might be a touch too fast, but I think the water goes deeper this way. The other half of the water I spray around the drip line. I spread around 2 gallons, then fill the bucket, the spray another gallon or two around the drip line, then top off the slow drip bucket.
I also put a small dam of soil around the tree, maybe a 2-3ft diameter circle. You can flood the spot without it running off too far.
Trees at camp get watered if they need them when I am there. They've been doing ok. No dead ones. All anty roots.
Another good thing to do is take a metal rod and push holes in the soil deeper. Fedco trees suggested it, I have tried it at my house.
Another thing you can do is plant the tree is some shade. If you got some shrubs or trees you need to clear at an edge of a field, leave it up there for a year while theapple treesgets some roots. You can also use a tree cage and put something on the top of it to shade it a bit too. I do that with freshly grafted trees. Also, keep birds away too.
I dig deep when I plant my trees. I ammend with peat moss and some lighter potting soil for my heavy clay soil at home. At camp, its sandy soil. I bring clay soil from home and heavier raised bed soil from the sotre. Mulch plenty too. Atleast a bag per tree. I also collect leaf mulch and concentrate it around the tree.
I water about 7-8 gallons a tree. I have 5 gallon water jugs with a 14" hole drilled in the bottom. They take about 10 minutes to drain out Might be a touch too fast, but I think the water goes deeper this way. The other half of the water I spray around the drip line. I spread around 2 gallons, then fill the bucket, the spray another gallon or two around the drip line, then top off the slow drip bucket.
I also put a small dam of soil around the tree, maybe a 2-3ft diameter circle. You can flood the spot without it running off too far.
Trees at camp get watered if they need them when I am there. They've been doing ok. No dead ones. All anty roots.
Another good thing to do is take a metal rod and push holes in the soil deeper. Fedco trees suggested it, I have tried it at my house.
Another thing you can do is plant the tree is some shade. If you got some shrubs or trees you need to clear at an edge of a field, leave it up there for a year while theapple treesgets some roots. You can also use a tree cage and put something on the top of it to shade it a bit too. I do that with freshly grafted trees. Also, keep birds away too.
I understand that young trees do best at an inch a week but I am just trying to get them to survive the dry spell and explode when things are better. Adult humans need around 2000 calories a day but can survive for months maybe years at much less calories, so my point, I give my young trees enough to get thorough drought and hopefully they can explode when Mother Nature takes over in the near future. So I water very little if at all until the grass in my yard does not need to be mowed for a week, so no growth. Then I start watering my 1 year old trees. I use 5 gallon buckets with a 1/8 hole drilled to slowly release 4 gallons of water per tree about every 7 to 10 days until rain. If it the drought continues past the non growing grass another week I will pick up the 2 year old trees and give them the 4 gallons also. I am not trying to make them grow I am just trying to let them survive. I am not an expert but I don't lose very many trees.
sandbur
5 year old buck +
Some say to keep the mulch just a bit away from the trunk.
sandbur
5 year old buck +
I use it on lighter soils.
4wanderingeyes
5 year old buck +
I have watered the first year, but rarely. I figured the roots will go deeper if it needs water, making it stronger. I haven’t lost any from drought, now bear snapping them off, I have lost probably 20. Right now my trees are all 4-20 years old, other than bear, those damn bag worms have kicked their ass.
g squared 23
5 year old buck +
Most newly planted trees get 1/2 a bucket of water at planting, and a weed mat. Then they get sprayed for weeds, which are competing and stealing moisture. Otherwise, they either make it or not. Last summer during our drought, the trees I planted didn’t do much but didn’t die.
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Haha - my grass been dead for two weeks. Been under a burn ban for three weeks. This is almost every year.
Similar threads
