For some time, I’ve been meaning to do a proper rundown on my drip system, complete with photos. I am going to start by giving a general description, and linking to some of the photos that I have already posted elsewhere, that reasonably represent what I do. I will try to get into the garden and take some photos to go with this, when I am home this weekend, but I tried to do that last weekend too.
I keep this blog ad free on purpose, but do occasionally plug companies or products that I like and use myself. I have no affiliation with any company I name here, other than being a satisfied customer. I also reserve the right to pan any company that I am dissatisfied with = and they will have to be very deserving of the pan before I will give it.
That being said, I buy my ⅛” micro-tubing from http://www.submatic.com. I have dealt with them since 1980 or 1981, and have always been satisfied with their service.
I make my own punch from a block of wood
and an appropriately sized nail, sharpened to a fine point. End clips are made from pieces of what ever I am using for feeder lines, or garden hoses or what ever comes to hand and will stay in place. If you are covering the drip lines with mulch or anything else, the end clips are not really necessary = they just convert the water to a drip, instead of letting it squirt across the bed (if you are running higher pressure/volume to increase watering, they can squirt quite a ways). The best feeder lines are the black plastic variety, although that can get a bit expensive if you have any amount to purchase. Cheap garden hose will work very well, but usually has the disadvantage of getting stiff after a season or two, and does not hold onto the emitter lines quite as well. If you are not going to be rolling the lines up to move them, garden hoses are a good cheap alternative = if you will want to be able to roll them up every year, spring for the black plastic.
You can make your individual emitter lines what ever length and spacing best suits your needs. If the drip lines are always going to be in the same locations, and the crops are going to be the same or similar every year, you can get very particular with your emitter layout, and reduce your water consumption accordingly. for instance, if you are always planting tomatoes with the same spacing,in the same rows, you could easily put very short emitter lines in exactly the right position, and reduce the amount of micro-tubing and water required. If you are going to be rotating things through the beds, or re-orienting garden areas, you might want to do a more general configuration, with longer and closer spaced emitter lines. I move stuff all over my beds, so I tend to do longer lines, and closer spaced. Since I have no water constraints, I tend to use a bit more, and a bit more frequently than I might otherwise = for me it pays off in larger harvests.
One of the advantages to using the micro-tubing is that it is very easy to clean a plugged emitter (which I seldom have to do) = pull the end cap off, and stick a piece of 16 gauge wire down the emitter line (metal guitar strings are great for this = they are stiff and don’t kink). When you cut your emitter lines, cut them at an angle
so you won’t plug them by pushing them against the far wall of the feeder line. If you make your emitter lines too long, they are going to be difficult to clean, as the wire will want to bend and kink. If you have an emitter in the wrong place, just cut it off at about 1”, and burn the end closed, or just pull off the end cap, and burn the end closed, leaving it in place in case you change your mind again.
I run a header line across the top end of all of my beds, and use the cheapest taps I can find to control the water on each bed (usually water tank taps). Run the largest diameter header line you can, to allow the largest volume possible to your feeder lines, bearing in mind that the first restriction in the line sets the volume for all of the line behind it = ie the tap that regulates your water sets the volume that will flow through the lines downstream from it. If your first tap is ½”, that is what regulates the volume you pass to the rest of the system. This doesn’t necessarily say to put the rest of the lines in at ½”, because you also have to deal with friction in the lines, which can make a difference if you have longer runs. I cobbled my initial header lines out of what ever was available here when I started, so I have a mix of 1”, and ¾” headers, which is all made moot by the fact that all of my taps controlling the beds are ½”. The individual feeder lines on the beds are a mix of ¾” black plastic, ½” black plastic, and ½” and ¾” garden hoses. My beds vary in length from 40’ to 100’, with emitter spacings from 9” to 18”staggered down each side of the feeder line. Emitter line lengths are from 6” to 15”, mostly around 9”. I can adequately water 400 emitters at once, using two hours for watering time. This gives me enough time to water my whole garden in one day (I have two taps and two header systems, with about 1100 feet of bed). If you use water soluble fertilizer (MiracleGro, etc) or lots of well filtered compost, other teas, or molasses,invest in an injection siphon.
It greatly simplifies feeding your garden, and cuts down on waste as well.
Because all of my lines are either plastic, or garden hose, I don't have to worry about winter frost damage. I disconnect the feed line, and open all of the valves and taps in the system, so there is no chance of water getting trapped in anything metal. The worst that might happen is a joint may get forced apart if water gets trapped in it, and it freezes solid.
In addition to the drip irrigation, I hand water new plantings of beans, carrots, onions and similar, two or three times daily, until they are large enough to mulch around. It substantially reduces the losses from stress.
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