Check plants to see if they need water. Pick up a few pots of each type of plant. If they are light in weight they need to be watered/fertilized. The universal soilless mix we typically use goes from enough water to dry rather quickly. For this reason, plants should be checked in the morning and later in the day until you have a feel for how much water they are using. The universal mix surface also becomes lighter brown in color as it dries, although this should not be used as the only indication of when to water.
Plants should be watered just as pots become light in weight. Waiting until your plant wilts, stresses the plant. Keeping the media too wet (watering too often) can cause the roots to rot. Also, try to water your plants before early afternoon to decrease the risk of foliar diseases, due to excess moisture on leaf surfaces.
When watering, soak pots thoroughly while keeping flowers and foliage as dry as possible. Water should drain from the holes in the bottom of the pot before you consider the plant well watered. This may mean applying water in 2 or 3 small applications a few minutes apart.
When watering by chaffin tubes, dissconnect the overhead wand and connect the watering hose to the chaffin tube hose. See connecting dosatron coupling instructions.Turn the water on and allow the water to flow through the tubes until water begins to come out of the bottom of the drainage holes. A word of caution, to reduce the risk of plant death or water stress, it is suggested to walk the length of the bench to make sure that all of the chaffin tubes are properly placed in the pots. As benches are shifted and people walk down aisles, tubes may be accidently bumped out of the pots.
When applying fertilizer with an overhead wand or chaffin tubes, use plain water every fourth or fifth watering to prevent soluble salts building up in the media. The fertilizer proportioners (Dos-a-trons) in the greenhouse have hoses that can be removed from the portable Dos-a-trons and connected directly to the water line. See protocol for using Dosatron.
