Home gardeners trying to conserve water and save on their water bill are finding a solution with drip irrigation.
Ben Langford, store manager at Hillsboro Pump Service Pipe and Supply Inc. (HPS) in Cornelius, Oregon, said water is a finite resource that is going to get scarcer over time.
“We’re going to need to pay attention to where that water is being wasted,” Langford said. “Drip irrigation is the best we have right now for using water where it is needed and not wasting it.”
Renee Phelps, owner of wholesale annuals grower Spring Creek Gardens Inc. in Junction City, installed a system in her own personal garden about six years ago.
“It worked so well that I installed one for my mom’s patio for Mother’s Day about three years ago,” Phelps said. “I mostly confined myself to hanging baskets and patio containers, which are the most likely to die during the summer months, and need water every single day.”
Companies like HPS and Fisher’s Supply Inc. in Canby sell drip irrigation supplies for homeowners as well as for farmers and nursery owners.
Langford designs and helps implement drip irrigation systems for home gardens and farms that want to minimize their water footprint.
Mitch Yoder, general manager of Fisher’s Supply, has worked with the company for about 20 years. In addition to drip irrigation, Fisher’s also installs pumps and plumbing. He sells a line of drip irrigation products including tubing and tape for residential and agricultural use.
“It comes down to troubleshooting,” Yoder said. “A lot of what we do with homeowners is they figure out what they want to do and we decide what works best for their situation.”
Pros and cons
Langford said the main benefit to using drip irrigation in the home garden is the fact that gardeners are only using the water they need and no more. “It’s going directly to the plants,” Langford said.
Phelps said she can only think of pros. “They are simple to install [and] inexpensive. They protect your plant investment, which can be extensive, and last for years,” Phelps said.
Drip irrigation uses much less water than sprinklers.
“Because you restrict the water use, you can water more areas with the same amount of water,” Yoder said.
However, the drip system has many more components to keep track of.
“The main con is that it requires more attention to detail than the traditional system, although the majority of that is in the initial setup,” Langford said.
“There is a little bit of checking that should be done annually to make sure there are no leaks, batteries in the timer are good, emitters are dripping, but this does not take much time,” Phelps said.
Yoder said some home gardeners in the countryside should be aware that wildlife could seek out the water source.
“Bugs, coyotes or rabbits could chew through the tape to get to the water source,” Yoder said. “Also because of the lower flow, it tends to plug up easier, so it needs more on the filtration side to prevent them from plugging up.”
Key things to know
Some of the key things to know are how much water is available, what the water source is and how much water pressure there is.
“Some people find out with a flow test or they’ll put a gauge on the systems to know the pressure,” Yoder said. “Some people know what pump they have if they are in the country with a well. Typically we make an educated guess if they’re on city water.”
Langford added the home gardener also needs to know what plants they are feeding and how much water each one needs.
“To use it efficiently you need to know how to only supply as much water as the plants require,” Langford said.
Phelps said her biggest suggestion for gardeners would be to map out the area they want to put under drippers so that they can trace the path of the hoses.
“For example, you might want to run a half-inch line up the porch columns, with a quarter-inch line coming off of it to each hanging basket or planter,” Phelps said. “You will need to calculate how much mainline you need, how much quarter line and how many emitters.”
Yoder said a common mistake people make is that they don’t understand the drip taping can only go so far and only support so many irrigators.
“If you’re running a quarter-inch tube and you have emitters running through it with the maximum length of 33 feet, you can run 16 emitters at a half gallon per hour,” Yoder said. “Any more than that, you’re running more than you can supply so you have to go up a size of tubing.”
Advice
A good drip irrigation system is customized to meet the specific needs of a home gardener.
“Find somebody who understands it and have them go over it with you to help understand what your needs are,” Langford said.
Phelps said most simple systems can be installed with a timer, a short section of hose off the timer, a coupler to go from a regular garden hose to the half inch poly drip line, a punch for the poly drip line, barbs to transition from the half inch line to the quarter inch line, and an assortment of emitters that plug into the quarter inch line.
“You might also need some Ts to split the line if you need to go in a couple different directions, elbows for corners, plugs for the end of each line and U nails to attach the lines to your decking,” Phelps said. “This is why it is good to map your path, so that you know how many elbows, Ts, et cetera you might need. Try a small system for your planters and baskets, and then branch out.”
Yoder said setting up a drip irrigation system can be fairly budget friendly too.
“Some of the stuff can get expensive, but if it’s designed well and laid out well, you can cover a lot of ground for a reasonable amount of money and save money on water and electricity if you’re on a pump,” Yoder said.
Although drip irrigation requires more planning and components, the benefit of saving water can pay off.
Emily Hoard is an Oregon-based freelance journalist covering business, environmental and agricultural news. She has a background in community reporting and a master’s degree in multimedia journalism. You can reach her at Hoarde123@Gmail.com