Automatic watering kit

[curlydolly]

I am growing veg in pots and growbags and also just put some new plants in beds. As we are going on holiday in June I am thinking about investing in one of those automatic watering systems ie Hozelock so I don't lose everything.
Does anyone have one and can you water pots, growbags and beds together with a single kit? I don't really want to have to buy more than one.
Thanks for any tips.

i put one in last summer but did a bit of planning and bought it all as separate parts and built it to suit, rather than a kit. From one timer I had branch hoses going to three clusters of pots, and three raised beds. It took a good couple of hours to set up but worked really well. I took it all down for the winter and now have a hideous jumble of hose and fittings in the shed that I really need to sort out and put back out. Don't leave it tll the last minute as you may need to go back to the shop for more parts, also you need to experment a bit to see how long you need the timer on for etc.

I used mini sprinklers for the pots and soaker tube for the raised beds.

Thanks for the advice - I will have a look at doing that but how did you work out what bits you need?

If you have one near by Wilkinsons have a good range. I use a system like this to drip feed my tomatoes. I take mine off a waterbutt rather than the tap. DH is paranoid about coming home to biblical floods if we took it off the tap! Do set the system up some time before you go so that you can make sure the watering quantities are right.

I spent about an hour, on my own in the garden centre looking at it all, I think I took a pen and paper as well so I could make notes. I did start a thread on here too, but can't remember if I got any good advice.

Gnome - if we were water metered I would feel the same way as your DH, luckily we're not. I had it on all summer last year without any mishaps. I think I have the actual main tap on quite slowly but for a longer period so the pressure doesn't get too high and pop any of the fittings. Hopefully my neighbour would notice and switch it off if anything untoward happened.

What I would say is that you have to stick to one brand, mine is Hozelock, the pieces are not compatible with other makes.