RickCorey said:Thanks, Rosie!
We might have discussed this before, but I forget the reason irrigation isn't practical for you - distance from the hose spigot? And it does kind of contradict the philosophy of "no pampering".
With some help, you could run 1/2" irrigation mainline up the slope to your rose beds, (maybe under or alongside the stairs) and some dripline (maybe under mulch) for each bed. Then add a "twist-timer" at the spigot, and you can water without climbing the stairs. 1/2" mainline can be had for $17 per 100 feet, or $66 for 500 feet.
But I don't know any alternative to hauling heavy mulch, other than winning a lottery.
Thank you for the idea, Rick. It's not about the watering. It's about the soil.
When I started this garden, my soil was dead. I could not dig a rose hole with a shovel. I could not dig a rose hole with a pick or even with a digging bar. It consisted of dense stones and clay. I started my rose holes with a pick and then was on my stomach prying the rocks apart making deep and wide holes. I didn't know enough to prepare whole beds.
Then I spent years hauling in animal manures, organic materials and improving the soil. Gradually, the soil improved so much that I had a lot of worms and could plant bulbs with a trowel. Of course, I could use a shovel. I kept bringing in more organic material each year. A lot of labor. The roses thrived. Then the drought hit.
I noticed the water didn't stay in the root zone long enough for the roses to take up moisture. Being very inventive, I figured out a watering method to slow evaporation above by using different mulching materials and to slow the drainage below ... I live on a watershed slope ... by pre-watering the day before I did my deep watering and didn't prune my roses so that they had less of a water demand. I knew they would abandon growth they could not support and I could prune them back after the drought. They all lived. The drought lasted four years in my part of California.
Last winter we got 40 inches of rain, a lot of it hard rain. The roses looked fantastic this spring. I went out and gathered a lot of leaves and shredded them ... much harder labor this year in my older body. When I pulled back the small wood chips that I used for mulch during the drought to slow evaporation to put down the leaf mulch, I found that all, well maybe not all, of that good soil I created was gone. There are no worms. I can't dig in my soil with a shovel. I can't dig in my soil with a trowel. Oops ! It all works in theory, but you cannot fight Mother Nature.
So, I am going to remove a LOT of the roses and plant a xeriscape garden, mulch with rock and gravel and enjoy a different kind of garden.
No, I am not going to quit gardening. But I am not going to pretend that building the soil is enough to have a garden that will last on this property. Gardening on a watershed property has some disadvantages that I had not anticipated. There will be another drought and I will be older. So, I might as well plan for that now.
This nursery's display garden's picture something like what I have in mind. Not exactly, but close ...
http://waterthriftyplants.com/...
