Eve Aqua on a rain barrel: check the pressure first

Two dates to cover

Leo Price would be away from Friday, October 16, through Sunday the 18th. Friday and Sunday were both times he normally set aside to deal with the garden. He had booked the trip before noticing that.

At home, watering fitted after work. Finish the audiobook edits, put the headphones down, take the can outside. With chapter files due on Thursday afternoon, he wanted the trip's loose ends settled early.

He had eight container plants and a rain barrel. Eve Aqua was his first shopping idea. He already used an iPhone, and a scheduled valve seemed a sensible way to reduce the favors he asked of neighbors.

The specifications gave him a question the app could not answer: how much pressure was reaching the valve?

The water has to arrive under pressure

Eve Aqua requires between 1 and 5 bar at its inlet, which Eve lists as 14.5 to 72.5 psi. The hose can fit even when the pressure is too low.

Leo's barrel supplied water by gravity. He had never measured the pressure at its outlet, so he could not assume it reached 1 bar. Below that, Eve Aqua is outside its operating range.

A suitable pressurized faucet changes the choice. Leo needed a system that drew from stored water. Adding an unspecified pump in front of the valve would leave him assembling a new set of connections and controls.

A pump in the kit

The GARDENA AquaBloom Water Reservoir Set gave him a specific alternative. The US 13301-25.000.00 package includes a tank, solar pump and water distribution kit. The official AquaBloom manual describes automatic watering for up to 20 plants without a connection to the water or electricity network.

The included pump was the useful difference for his eight pots. AquaBloom could draw the stored water itself. Leo chose this kit to save for.

AquaBloom belongs outdoors in a sunny position. GARDENA specifies an initial eight hours of charging in sunlight with the control off, or separate charging of its rechargeable batteries. Its maximum suction height is 1.5 metres and maximum delivery head is 4 metres. Water must be no warmer than 35 C.

Rainwater is permitted, although muddy water and fertilizer are excluded. The filter and routing matter too. GARDENA warns that a reservoir above the outlet can keep draining after the pump stops. Its remedy places the first dripper above the reservoir water level to interrupt that flow.

Leo put those conditions on the setup list. He needed to measure the route and find the sunny mounting position before installing anything.

The next purchase, and this Friday

He still needed to check the current price against his $70 purchase budget and $90 in monthly discretionary money. AquaBloom went onto his savings list.

Before leaving it in charge of the pots, he would set a program, check every outlet and measure reservoir use. The number of plants alone would not tell him how much water they needed or how long a tank would last.

He planned to make those checks outside his editing hours. Whether the pump sound would suit him remained open.

For the approaching trip, Leo wrote Sana Clarke a request with the two dates and the existing watering-can arrangement. They had learned to write shared settings down. He left space beside each date for her answer. Plant care would stay on his trip list until he heard back.

When this does not matter

Hand watering or an agreed caretaker already meets your needs.