How to Buy the Right Garden Hose

You have a right to expect that the garden hose you buy will serve you for many years, but most gardeners find that they have to replace their hoses far more often than they’d like. How do you choose a durable garden hose that won’t kink, won’t leak and won’t let your down? Check out these tips from Family Handyman on how to check out a garden hose before you buy it.
Try to Put a Kink in the Hose
The last few years have been big ones in the gardening hose industry. You could have gone years without hearing about hoses unless you were specifically looking for one. The past few years, the airwaves and your inbox have been crowded with advertisements for flexible garden hoses, coil garden hose, shrinking garden hoses and even more specialty hoses for your home and garden. How do you decide which one is a good gardening hose for you?
First, ignore the advertisements and hype. When Consumer Reports did an investigation on those amazing shrinking hoses, they found that they simply didn’t perform as advertised – and their Facebook page was inundated with messages from people who had been disappointed by hoses that leaked, exploded and otherwise made things even worse. Instead of believing the marketing hype, do a few tests of your own on the garden hose you’re thinking of buying.
First, try to bend the hose at a 90-degree angle. The thicker the walls of the garden hose are, the more difficult it will be to bend at an angle. A cheap vinyl hose will easily form an angle – and will almost certainly kink in use. A better quality garden hose, including many well-made polyurethane hoses, will resist bending. With the highest quality hoses, the best you’ll be able to do is make a U shape where you’re bending it.
Second, try to kink the hose deliberately. Uncoil a couple of feet of the garden hose and try to coil it back in the other direction. If it develops kinks before it’s been used, you can just imagine how it will kink after it’s been baking in the sun for a few weeks.
Finally, check out the garden hose fittings and choose one that has solid, heavy, cast-brass fittings. The fittings on your hose determine how securely it will connect to the faucet. Flimsy stamped fittings or plastic fittings can bend, break and crack, resulting in either a useless garden hose that can’t be attached to the faucet at all, or one that sprays water at the connection.
A high-quality garden hose can be your best friend when you’ve got watering and washing tasks to do outside. Don’t depend on a hose that will only let you down.

Can You Use a Garden Hose Indoors?

Your garden hose is a trusted companion, helping you with your gardening and outdoor work around the house. You can hook up your garden hose to your outdoor faucet and cart it around to anywhere you need it using wheeled garden reels. Your hose can help you get water to the furthest reaches of your yard and driveway without having to haul it around in a bucket – why can’t you have the same convenience indoors? With a few accessories and some forethought, you can have the same convenience your garden hose offers you outdoors for your indoor gardening adventures.
Coil Garden Hose
The coil garden hose was created specifically to help with watering needs in tight spaces like patio gardens, but in most cases, manufacturers assume that you’ll be hooking up your coil garden hose to an outdoor water spigot and bringing it around to the patio. Apartment dwellers may not have that luxury. Even those that have patios large enough for a container garden may not have easy access to an outdoor water hookup. The coil garden hose may be easy to store, but in most cases, it needs a little help to be an efficient indoor garden hose. Exactly what other accessories you need will depend on a few important factors.
Water Source
You’ll have either two or three sources of water for your watering needs: your kitchen faucet, your bathroom faucet and your washing machine hookup. The easiest choice for connecting a garden hose indoors is your washer hookup because chances are that it’s already threaded to accept a garden hose. If you don’t have a washer hookup in your apartment, you’ll probably need a faucet hose adapter. They’re easily available at most hardware stores or online.
Distance
The distance you need to travel will determine the length of garden hose you need. In most cases, a 25 foot garden hose will suffice, but in larger apartments – or if you have to bring the hose from the back of the house to the front – you may need a 50-foot garden hose. In either case, a 1/2 inch garden hose is likely to be your best choice. It will deliver enough water pressure to get the job done and offers less risk of flooding your kitchen and living room.
If you’re going to be connecting a garden hose to an indoor faucet and carrying the hose through the house, you’ll want to be sure you’re using a high quality, drinking safe garden hose with solid brass garden hose fittings. A sturdy brass fitting is far less likely to warp out of shape, and will make a secure, water-tight connection to your faucet so it doesn’t leak all over your floor.
Likewise, if you’re going to use a kitchen or bathroom faucet, be sure to choose a high-quality, well-made hose-to-faucet adapter that won’t leak and spray water all over your kitchen.
There’s no reason to haul buckets of water through your house to water a patio garden just because you don’t have an outdoor faucet. With proper attention to details, you can easily adapt an indoor faucet for use with a good quality garden hose.

Hate to Water? Try a New Garden Hose

You don’t have to look far to find the war stories written by people who have been beaten by the lowly garden hose. Look, we all know that garden hoses are out to get you. They coil around your ankles, catch on patio table legs, and hide in the lawn just waiting to trip up your lawnmower, but they’re a necessary evil. Without a garden hose, most gardeners would be consigned to hauling bucket after bucket of water from the spigot to wherever the soil is too dry to support healthy plant life. And frankly, even wrestling with a recalcitrant garden hose is better than hauling water around your vegetable garden and lawn 2 gallons at a time.

That doesn’t mean you have to like it, though, and all over the Web on gardening discussion groups and gardening blogs, gardeners vent their irritation with the garden hoses they love to hate. Do any of these sound like a garden hose you’ve owned?

It’s so heavy that by the time you’re done watering, your arms and shoulders ache from dragging it from one spot to another.

The plastic garden hose fittings cracked and broke the first time you tried to tighten it to the spigot – which you had to do because it insisted on spitting water in your face every time you turned it on.

Or the soft metal faucet connector decided to tangle with the car and got all bent out of shape when it lost. You’d think you could bend it back into shape, but no.

Kink-free hoses just aren’t.

But what about those new-fangled garden hoses? If you haven’t been tempted by the folksy TV ads promising you that a coil garden hose will take up just a few feet of space on your patio but stretch to three times its length to reach every corner of your yard, you’re just not frustrated enough yet. In fact, the past few years have seen an explosion of new  garden hose styles to take the place of your not-so-trusty 1/2 inch garden hose in all its leaky infamy. If you’re in the market to replace your current hose, you’ll have an embarrassment of choices, including drinking safe garden hose, heated water hose, coil garden hose, 3/4 inch garden hose, one inch water hose and more.

Don’t put up with your old, bulky garden hose another day. Check out the new styles of hoses available to make your gardening chores so much easier.

Specialty Garden Hose Applications for Your Specialty Needs

Sometimes a standard garden hose just doesn’t do the trick. Every gardener, farmer and homeowner knows that the garden hose is one of your most important tools, but what if you need more than just a good way to get water from your outdoor faucet to where you want to put it? There are a number of specialty garden hose products that may meet your needs.

Cold Weather Watering

Your livestock still need watering when the temperatures drop below freezing. A standard one inch water hose won’t do the trick – standing water freezes in the hose and can cause even worse problems. What’s the solution? A heated garden hose can keep the water moving and the hose blockage free. There are a number of heated garden hose options on the market, but the best one – the GatorHyde Freeze Free Hose, offers some features you won’t find in many. The hose plugs into any GCFI protected extension cord and has an electric cuff to protect the plug for weather damage. Even better, it has some very nifty energy saving features that you won’t find anywhere else. The heated garden hose turns on when the temperatures drop to 35 F. and back off when the air temperature reaches 48 F., so it’s only drawing electricity when you need it.  It’s also drinking water safe, so you can feel comfortable using it to supply water for your RV or to fill water troughs for livestock.

Small Spaces

The wrong garden hose can make it a real challenge to garden in tight spaces like patios and small garden beds. The Mean Green coil garden hose is the perfect solution. The coiled hose is a retractable garden hose that easily stretches to its full length so you can reach all your flowers and lawn, then retracts to its original size for easy storage. In between, the coil garden hose is easier to navigate and maneuver. It’s lightweight, made of durable and safe polyurethane, and won’t ever kink. The industrial strength coil garden hose comes in three colors: green, blue or yellow, and is available in lengths from 15 feet (coiled length just over 2 feet) to 50 feet (coiled length 66 inches).

From drinking safe garden hose to lightweight polyurethane garden hoses, you’ll find garden hose choices that meet all of your need when you shop carefully. Don’t settle for a cheap garden hose from the local big box store. Figure out what you need, and then shop for your ideal garden hose online.

Do You Know Someone Who Could Use a Garden Hose Gift?

A garden hose is generally one of the last things to come to mind when it’s time to buy gifts, but the right garden hose could be the perfect present under some circumstances. Can’t think of a single time when a garden hose would be an appropriate gift? Here are a few times that the right hose for the garden or home just might be the most thoughtful gift you could give.

Housewarming Gift

A high-quality garden hose is one of the most used and useful tools in any homeowners’ garage or tool shed, but many new homeowners don’t think about that hose until the first time they need it. A 1/2 inch garden hose won’t be the most glamorous gift the new homeowner receives, but it will probably be the most useful. Make it even more useful by including a selection of garden hose accessories to go along with the hose. You might include a variable spray nozzle, or a Y-connector that allows you to attach two garden hoses to one outdoor faucet, or look through the selection of garden hose reels to find one that will look great in the new yard.

Wedding or Shower Gift

Again, a garden hose is not the most glamorous gift the happy couple will receive, but it’s definitely a wedding gift that will help them in setting up their new household. Most folks think about the interior when choosing wedding gifts. The bride- and groom-to-be will probably get all the kitchen accessories and appliances they’ll need – including duplicates. There will be towel sets and duvet covers and china and glassware and flatware. Unless they’ve asked specifically, though, it’s not likely that many wedding guests will think of giving them gifts relating to the outside of the home. Trust me. The first time they go to wash the car, water the garden or hose off the driveway, they’ll appreciate your gift of an appropriate garden hose enormously.

New Apartment Gift

You don’t have to own a new home to appreciate a garden hose. People who live in apartments need to wash their cars and hose off their patios, and many garden on the patio or a yard. Acoil garden hose is an excellent choice for apartment dwellers who garden in tight spaces. If they don’t have access to an outdoor faucet, consider including an adapter that will allow them to attach the garden hose to the kitchen or bathroom faucet.

A garden hose may not seem like much of a gift, but there are definitely situations when it’s a gift that will be greatly appreciated and see a lot of use.

Four Reasons to Hate Your Old Garden Hose

Most serious gardeners – and a lot of homeowners who don’t garden – have a love-hate relationship with their garden hose – and there’s not a lot of love in that equation. Despite the fact that the garden hose is the single piece of gardening equipment that most gardeners use every single day during the gardening season, a lot of folks don’t put a lot of thought into buying the right one – and once they’ve bought one (usually the cheapest one they can find that meets their minimum requirements), they often don’t realize just how much of their time and energy they spend dealing with a recalcitrant, balky or downright surly garden hose. Is it time to replace your old hose with a shiny, new one that will do what you want it to – without getting all kinky and spitting water at you? Here are four reasons to hate your old garden hose enough to replace it with one that will do the job so much better.

It Doesn’t Reach Where You Want It to Go

Okay, admit it. You’ve done this: you stretch the hose as far as you can – usually going back to unkink it when it decides to get curled up on itself – turn the water as high as possible and aim the water for the one corner of the garden where you garden hose doesn’t quite reach.  Among other things, that kind of stretching isn’t good for your garden hose – it puts stress on the garden hose fittings and makes it more likely that it will separate from the tubing. More importantly, it makes it a whole lot harder to water the whole garden effectively.

It’s Got Splits and Leaks Here, There and Everywhere

Cheap hoses split and break with alarming regularity. Most commonly, they leak around the faucet, where they don’t attach properly. Better quality hoses are made from materials that resist splitting and separating from the garden hose fittings, so you don’t end up patching them with adhesive tape.

The Nozzle End Is Deformed and Misshapen

Speaking of garden hose fittings, cheap hoses often have fittings made of tin or other soft metal that bends and deforms with the slightest pressure. You never have to worry about your hose fitting your faucet when you invest in a good quality garden hose with solid brass or high quality plastic fittings.

It Could Be Poisoning You

You knew your garden hose was out to get you, but you probably didn’t realize that it’s trying to poison you. A number of consumer watchdog groups have tested the water that comes out of typical cheap hoses and found alarming amounts of lead and other chemicals. The solution is a drinking safe garden hose if you drink from your hose or fill kiddie pools with it.

Why put up with a gardening tool you hate when you can eliminate the problems and make your gardening much easier with a new garden hose?

Give Mom a Summer of Fun Gardening with a Garden Hose for Mother’s Day

Mother’s Day is coming up fast. Have you decided on a gift for mom yet? Before we go any further, let’s get one thing out of the way. Mothers do not hate practical Mother’s Day gifts. In fact, mothers love gifts that show you appreciate the things she loves to do and see how hard she works. So what do you get for the mom who loves gardening and working around the outside of the house? How about replacing that worn-out old garden hose she’s been lugging around the yard and driveway for years?

Oh, I know. You’re thinking, “A garden hose? For Mother’s Day? Are you kidding?”   Not at all. Here’s why a new garden hose makes a great Mother’s Day gift for a mom who loves to spend time in the garden.

The Right Garden Hose Makes Gardening Easier

Unless you’re the one doing the yard work, you don’t realize how much time gardeners spend wrestling with a balky hose that insists on kinking up – usually all the way across the yard from where you’re standing. Aside from that, older garden hoses can be bulky and unwieldy, wrapping themselves around patio furniture and getting caught on garden edging. And if she works in a small space, a coil garden hose practically stores itself, saving her a ton of time every time she waters her plants. Don’t you think mom would rather spend that time doing the more fun part of gardening?

A Bigger Garden Hose Gets the Watering Done Faster

No, not a longer hose – a fatter one. In fact, a 3/4 inch garden hose delivers water to the plants twice as fast as a 1/2 inch garden hose. And because you get stronger, steadier water pressure, mom can take advantage of the variety of garden hose nozzles on the market for specialty uses like misting. Again, mom can certainly find better ways to use her time if she can get the garden watered in half the time, right?

She’d Never Think to Buy One for Herself.

Well, if it sprang a leak, she might, but chances are she’d just patch up the old thing and keep right on using it. It can be hard to justify replacing a trusty old tool when it still does the job, especially if the only one it inconveniences is mom. So, rather than spending the money to buy a high-quality, durable garden hose, she’ll keep wrestling with it and dragging it around, making more work for herself.

A new garden hose may not have the bling factor of a pretty birthstone ring – you know, with all the kids’ birthstones – but you know she’ll never take it off and lose it in the flower bed, right? Mom probably won’t ask for a new garden hose for Mother’s Day, but you can bet she’ll appreciate it every single day of the growing season.