If you don’t have one of those fancy, in-ground, automated, box controlled sprinkler systems (which I admit are cool in a nerdy kind of way), you really have to be around when watering, otherwise you’ll be leaving the water on all day. I mean, you can do that, but you’re water bill will really, well, surprise you at the end of the month. For those of us who still want our old school, above ground sprinklers and hoses, there is the Dual Hose Programmable Timer.

The most obvious thing this does is splitting the faucet, allowing it to power two different hoses. Now, that’s “meh”; the real cool thing is the 9V powered programmable box. You can set either one or both hoses to turn on for as little as 1 minute or as long as 23 hours (big yard, thirsty grass, who knows?) And unlike most of these systems, which are ridiculously complicated to set up, mainly because I refuse to read the vague directions, you program the box with a simple three button setup. Now, there is one drawback. . . sorta. Watering routines can only be setup 7 days in advance, so every week, you need to reprogram. This is a bit of an annoyance, but you don’t always want the same schedule for watering different plants, areas of the yard, etc. I guess it’s more of a half-feature if such a thing actually exists.

The completely waterproof Dual Hose Programmable Timer retails for $130. Sure it’s pricey, but it’s a lot cheaper than the thousands you’ll spend on a below-ground system (or the money you’ll pay to the water company when you run your sprinkler 24/7).

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