A garden hose may look like a soft, forgiving thing that will take anything you can throw at it. And yes, you can subject it to a lot and not see immediate damage. But listen – don’t step on your garden hose. Don’t run it over with a wheelbarrow loaded with sand or rocks, don’t kink it on purpose, or by man-handling it. Don’t pull it so hard it slips out of its fittings. In short, don’t abuse your garden hose! You could kink it, restricting the water-flow through it – and a kink could lead to a tear of one or more layers in your hose.
But what can you do to minimize damage to your garden hose? First of all, you can invest in a better hose. Heavy duty garden hose made of either reinforced rubber, vinyl or polyurethane will take a lot more rough-handedness, and since accidents do happen – even when you are very careful to avoid them – investing in a strong water hose will pay for itself regardless of what other measures you may take. Speaking of which: the next logical step is to make sure that hose is kept out of harms way as much as possible. This is best done through some means of garden hose storage, like one of the many types of garden hose reels available these days. The main point of keeping your water hose coiled up on a reel, I think, is to get it off the ground. A water hose left on the ground tends to end up in one big tangle, getting kinked – not to mention dirty. And as you know, it is also in danger of getting stepped on and generally abused. So get that hose up on a reel, like a wall mounted garden hose reel or a portable one, and see its life expectancy go way, way up.
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