Smart Watering is an automated watering schedule that uses information about environmental conditions to ensure your plants get the optimum amount of water. Evaporation will draw moisture from your garden, while rainfall and irrigation will add moisture. Understanding these conditions allows Hydrawise to decide when the time is right to water your garden.
In this example, there are two Smart Watering zones highlighted in red:
The Watering Triggers use Smart Watering Adjustments and have been left as default, with both switched on:
The second option, USE FORECAST RAINFALL TO PREDICT SMART WATERING, assists with delaying irrigation when rain is predicted. Refer to the example below to see how this is affected when it is turned off.
Your watering schedule will look like these settings combined with the weather forecast from your selected weather station.
Now, if we are to change the watering trigger on the second option to off as shown below:
When checking your watering schedule, you will notice that it has been changed to water a day earlier on both zones. This is because the trigger "Use forecast rainfall to delay Smart Watering" is on (this is based on the calculations from the weather station; there is rain predicted on 18th). It has not been scheduled to water on that day, and watering has been pushed to the 19th. However, since we turned off this feature, watering will occur regardless of rain is predicted.
If you choose to change the watering adjustment, you can always go to the tuning tab on any zone for Smart Watering Predictive Watering™ to modify the peak watering day as shown below: For example, if you have a peak watering day set to 2 and the slider is changed to -50%, this will add a day to the peak watering day making it 3.
Please refer to this link to gain further understanding of smart watering if needed.
Smart Watering and time-based Predictive Watering™ achieve similar water savings due to “predictive weather” watering triggers, time-based watering is easier to understand and adjust.