A home irrigation system is the ideal way to water your lawn and garden, as it is designed to put the water only where it’s needed. The system uses pipes, fittings, sprays and drippers to precisely water only within the boundaries of the watering area and avoid wasteful overspray.

This is achieved by dividing your yard into zones or watering areas and using the most appropriate watering method for each area. You already know that parts of your yard have different watering needs. The ferns in the shade require less water than the flowers in the rockery, while the lawn in full sun is different again.

In a home irrigation system, each of these different watering needs becomes a separate watering area and (this is the important part) should be watered by its own irrigation line. This is the basic principle of home irrigation systems – separate lines for separate watering areas.

If you do not have enough water pressure to run all of the sprinklers in a watering area at once, you will need to install more than one irrigation line. Simply divide the area into two or three lines and water one line at a time.

Of course, all of these irrigation lines need to be connected to the water supply and there is a variety of different ways to do this.

One single watering line could just be connected directly to your existing garden tap. Or up to four lines could be watered by simply adding a multi-outlet tap to your garden tap. For more control over watering times, add a manual or electronic tap timer. However, the ultimate, time saving, home irrigation system is a fully automatic hub and controller.

An automatic hub connects all of your lines to the water supply at a central point using electric solenoid valves. Then the electronic controller remembers when and how long to water each watering area. An automatic hub can either be installed externally near your garden tap, or buried underground and connected directly into your water supply pipe.

Whilst water conservation is on everyone’s mind, being water wise doesn’t mean having a brown desert for a yard, but it does mean using a precious resource like water very wisely. With 60% of household water consumption used on lawns and gardens, installing an automatic home irrigation system is the best action you can take to control your outdoor water usage.