Start watering

The Start watering action starts a watering cycle in an irrigation zone.

This is handy when you want to water on demand or from an automation, for example giving the lawn an extra run on a hot afternoon. You can set how long the cycle runs, or let it fall back to the default duration configured in the Hydrawise app.

Using this action from the user interface

If you prefer building automations and scripts visually, Home Assistant walks you through this action step by step. You pick what to target, tweak a few options, and save. No YAML knowledge required.

To start watering from an automation or a script:

1. Go to Settings > Automations & scenes.
2. Open an existing automation or script, or select Create automation > Create new automation.
3. If you’re setting up a new automation, add a trigger in the When section. Scripts don’t need a trigger. They run when something else calls them.
4. In the Then do section, select Add action.
5. Select what you want to control. Under By target (see Targets), select the irrigation zone’s manual watering switch.
6. From the actions shown for that target, select Start watering.
7. Optionally set the Duration.
8. Select Save.

Options in the UI

Using this action in YAML

If you work directly in YAML, or you want to know exactly what Home Assistant does under the hood, this section has the technical reference. It lists the field names you use in YAML, their types, and which ones are required.

In YAML, refer to this action as hydrawise.start_watering. A basic example looks like this:

action: hydrawise.start_watering
target:
  entity_id: switch.front_lawn_manual_watering
data:
  duration: 15

This runs a 15-minute watering cycle on the front lawn zone.

Options in YAML

Targets of the action

This action requires a target. The target is the object of the action. You can point the action at a single entityAn entity represents a sensor, actor, or function in Home Assistant. Entities are used to monitor physical properties or to control other entities. An entity is usually part of a device or a service. [Learn more], a device, an area, a floor, or a label, and Home Assistant will run the action on every matching switch entity behind that target.

• Entity: one specific switch entity, such as switch.living_room.
• Device: every switch entity that belongs to a device.
• Area: every switch entity in a room or area.
• Floor: every switch entity on a floor.
• Label: every switch entity that shares a label.

You can also select different target types in one action. For example, you can add a specific entity and an area as targets in the same action to run the action on both of them at once.

Try it yourself

Ready to test this? Open Developer tools > Actions, search for this action, fill in the fields, and select Perform action. You see what happens on your actual entitiesAn entity represents a sensor, actor, or function in Home Assistant. Entities are used to monitor physical properties or to control other entities. An entity is usually part of a device or a service. [Learn more] without writing a line of YAML.

Still stuck?

The Home Assistant community is quick to help: join Discord for real-time chat, post on the community forum with the action you’re calling and what you expected to happen, or share on our subreddit /r/homeassistant.

Related actions

These actions work well alongside this one:

• Suspend automatic watering: Suspends an irrigation zone’s automatic watering schedule until the given date and time.

• Resume automatic watering: Resumes an irrigation zone’s automatic watering schedule.