When there are just a few pots on one of the decks, it is convenient to carry a couple of watering cans.

There is no water faucet near the native plant area, so I hook up four hoses to water each of the almost 30 native plants.

I use so many hoses on this spread-out property that I often connect or disconnect two, or change the nozzle as I'm moving from watering one area to another (or changing from/to a drip irrigation section) that I put a shut-off valve on most of the hoses.

I have a water hose shut-off coupler valve on the male end of each hose. With the shut-off valve off, I can turn the water on at the faucet, move the hose to the desired area, and attach another hose at the coupler or change from one spray attachment to another. I use this often to water raised beds manually using a nozzle and then switch to the drip irrigation timer.

My favorite nozzle is the Orbit 58297N 58297 Hose Spray Nozzle. It has a rain-like spray, perfect for use in watering flowers, shrubs, raised beds, and newly seeded areas. It has a built in valve and sprays a wide, fan-shaped area, for thorough watering of a bed.

To water just the correct amount or a repetitive amount, I connect a timer to a faucet and direct the spray manually. Most often I use this to irrigate the raspberries. In a few cases I irrigate a flower bed manually through a timer, so I know how much water I have sprayed.

When watering newly seeded grass. Need to avoid too much watering and flooding a specific area, which may wash away the seeds or make them too wet.