If you do a lot of gardening, your garden hose will be exposed to much wear and tear. Somewhere along the way, your trusty hose may eventually give and have holes and leaks along. While the best option is to replace a weatherbeaten hose, some tightwads may try to get away with a few repairs here and there. If you happen to be one, read on and find out simple steps on how to repair a cracked or leaking garden hose.

Patching

The best way to repair rubber garden hoses is with rubber patches and some duct tape. Here’s how:

• Sand the surface surrounding the hole or leak.
• Sand the surface of the rubber patch.
• Apply some contact or vulcanizing rubber cement on both surfaces.
• Apply the patch over the hole or leak.
• Wrap the area with some duct tape for good measure. Make sure you extend beyond the opposite sides of the patch.

Quick-Melt Fix

Using an older soldering iron or a heated nail, graze it over the leak or hole. The idea is to melt some material so that it would coat over the leak, thus, sealing it. However, this technically weakens the hose and may be only good for quick fixes.

Convert it to a Soaker Hose

If there’s just too many holes and leaks in your hose, why not just punch it full of holes and convert it to a soaker hose? Just punch holes evenly across the legnth using a nail, drill or an icepick.