# How many inches of water for new seed/new lawn?



## dph (Jul 31, 2018)

Pretty much everything you read about watering new seed says 10 minutes, 2 to 3 times a day. But I have rotors that deliver 0.5 inches per hour and spray heads (because of an irregular lawn shape) that deliver 1.5 in/hr. So what does "10 minutes" mean for them?

Obviously the best way to determine this is to check the soil several times a day to make sure the top 1/2" to 1" is staying moist throughout the day. I just wanted to roughly estimate this.


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## JDgreen18 (Jun 14, 2018)

@dph I think its not really about the inches of water when thry are just seeds, its about keeping them wet. Too much water at once and you can wash away the seeds. You might need to water more than 2-3 times a day depending on how hot it is and how much sun you get. I plan on watering my KBG reno 4 times a day as its in full sun and I'm seeding in early August.


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## ken-n-nancy (Jul 25, 2017)

dph said:


> ... watering new seed ...
> 
> Obviously the best way to determine this is to check the soil several times a day to make sure the top 1/2" to 1" is staying moist throughout the day. I just wanted to roughly estimate this.


You've got it! The intent is to keep the soil surface moist to enable the seed to germinate. Unfortunately, the number of minutes how many times a day needed to do that without causing puddling or runoff is highly variable, so a general answer to your question isn't really possible.

The reason there is a lot of variance in this is the sprinkler time needed to keep the surface seed moist is greatly affected by things such as temperature, humidity, sun exposure, soil type, seed cover type, sprinkler delivery rate, wind, and probably other factors I forgot to include in this list.

The right way to do it is just as you describe -- set up a watering schedule and check the soil several times each day to observe how it's working out.


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## ken-n-nancy (Jul 25, 2017)

Just as a data point, I currently have about 150sqft in a little mini-renovation of a shady area. Our water delivery through our irrigation system is very slow. I have my timer set up for 7 minutes of watering 6 times a day, which seems to be about right for an average late July weather day -- it's too much for a cloudy & humid day, but too little for a hot, dry day.


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## dph (Jul 31, 2018)

Thanks, this has been helpful, including those data points. That's kind of what I was looking for. I will test and share my results as well. I have a Rachio. I think if I play around with the manual cycle and soak settings, I can get several smaller, but frequent waterings.

I think I'll also test to see how much my oscillating sprinkler delivers in 10 minutes. Although, that is probably highly variable as well.


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## JackH (Apr 19, 2018)

Rachio has an article on new seeding schedules. I am going to look at this soon too.

https://support.rachio.com/hc/en-us/articles/115010380027-New-Seeding-Schedule


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## synergy0852 (Jun 30, 2018)

JackH said:


> Rachio has an article on new seeding schedules. I am going to look at this soon too.
> 
> https://support.rachio.com/hc/en-us/articles/115010380027-New-Seeding-Schedule


Tried this, they only let you choose start or end times so it's not ideal as it will water all night when not needed. They need to allow the user to enter a window of time to make this usable in my opinion...


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## dph (Jul 31, 2018)

synergy0852 said:


> JackH said:
> 
> 
> > Rachio has an article on new seeding schedules. I am going to look at this soon too.
> ...


I thought of that also before reading that article and came to the same conclusion. You definitely don't want it running all night long. The article says "Decide what time and day your schedule will begin (and end, if you like)", implying you can set an end time, but you can't. Maybe that article was based on an older version of the app. They did a big revamp for this year.


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## JackH (Apr 19, 2018)

I see what you mean. 
Tried to set for every 2 hours as an test example using fixed schedule and it wants to run all night. Tried end time before 7PM as an example and it still goes all night. 
I recently installed the gen 2 so I have the latest app and firmware.


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## g-man (Jun 15, 2017)

Trigger it from IFTTT.


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## Eric (Aug 15, 2017)

Set 4 different programs and run them at the same time!


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## JackH (Apr 19, 2018)

I was digging a bit and found another Rachio article that suggests using multiple fixed schedules as Eric suggests and also mentions the IFTTT ( thanks for the suggestion G-Man)
https://rachio.helpscoutdocs.com/article/167-new-seeding-schedule


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