Remote drip irrigation system

Discussion in 'Designing, building, making and powering your life' started by warren.cascade, Dec 20, 2007.

  1. warren.cascade

    warren.cascade Junior Member

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    Hello,
    I am planning to plant in about 30 shrubs and trees at a semi-remote location. I was wondering if you'll have experience/examples/critique of such systems.
    The current plan is to place 20 x 55 gallon barrels that will be all linked together at the top of a hill. Then fasten in a drip irrigation system running down the hill to all the plants that will have a solar powered or battery timer. I'm figuring 2 gallons of water per plant per week. There is a road 300' from where the barrels will be placed, so if they don't get filled up by the late winter and spring rains i am thinking i can run a hose/pipe to the barrels from the road and can fill them up from a water trailer.

    It's on the edge of being an elaborate(too much energy input) system for the bounty I'll be planting in, but I'm currently feeling it's worth it. Since it'll be a few years before I get in better road and water access, and if I get these plants established then I may have some food crops going by the time I start building on the land.

    Although I am also tempted to just try and plant in native or more drought tolerant plants this year so I don't have to install this system.
    These are the native plants I'm planning to plant in:
    red osier dogwood
    blue elderberry
    black elderberry

    and these not so native:
    chestnut
    english walnut
    cherry red currant
    blueberry

    Anyway around it, I'm looking forward to some fun up at twisted hazels orchard in Toutlel, WA this late winter spring.

    thanks,
    warren neth
     
  2. TropicalRose

    TropicalRose Junior Member

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    I'm not familiar with most of the trees you are planting but its a definite bonus to have producing food trees on the place when you move in. We are doing something similar but cart water twice a week during our dry season which is barely keeping some alive and we have had losses. Drought tolerant trees would probably be your best bet for initial plantings. How much water you give them also depend on your type of soil, sandy soil need more frequent watering. Good luck with it.
     
  3. SueinWA

    SueinWA Junior Member

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    Warren, you do have an advantage in that you don't have to water the majority of the year. The dry season only runs about July through October. It sounds doable to me.

    As for being labor-intensive, if you are the one providing the labor, you are making an investment in the land... literally, sweat equity. And if naysayer says you're wasting time and energy, well, whose time and energy is it?

    Sue
     
  4. 9anda1f

    9anda1f Administrator Staff Member

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    Hey Warren,

    Sounds like you're off to a great start! You'll have an impressive water storage capability at 1100 gallons that you can use year after year!

    Questions: How are you planning to catch the water with the barrels at the top of a hill? Is there a roof area you can use? Will a drip irrigation system encourage roots to go deep? (I've never tried it)

    One year, during a particularly dry summer here in Washington, our road was out (during construction) and I carried water (in five gallon containers) up the hill to keep our newly planted fruit trees alive. They got 2 1/2 gallons each, about twice a week and were heavily mulched (over a rather gravelly/sandy "soil" in full sun). They did very well on that, and with the mulching I probably could have cut their water needs by half (i.e. watering once per week). Under the mulch, the top couple of inches of dirt was dry but maintained it's moisture further down.

    Good luck! Let us know how it turns out (pics would be cool too!).

    9anda1f
    Bill Kearns
    ("Bill who likes Bonsai") :D
     
  5. warren.cascade

    warren.cascade Junior Member

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    Hey folks,
    Ya Bill the water storage will HOPefully be around for quite awhile, so that's probably what makes it worth to me right now. I'll be needing a water souce up there for all kinds of things. My great grandfather however did have a spring box built on the site at the bottom of the hill that he got a small amount of water from, but bears would wander through and naw on the tubing! So I'm looking forward to some fun maintanence like picking up barrels that elk or bear find as nice rubbing posts.

    The water collection surface is still up in the air, or rather not in the air yet. I'm debating whether to throw up a quick roof structure, that would be nice to have anyways, with metal roofing, or possibly put together some form of tarp collector. Without anything, the barrels would probably fill up about half full so we'll see.

    At this point I'm wondering if it'll be worth it to invest in the drip irrigation set up or just hand water with buckets.
    It'll cost about $250-350 for all the drip line equipment. I'm thinking that i'll be able to use the stuff on other projects later, but although the pipes are advertised as being re-usable, I'm not sure it'll be as good on the second round of set-up. Leaky pluged holes and the sort. But then there's the amount of gas i'd be investing in driving a hour and a half up to the site once a week to hand water. Ikes..

    Sooo onward with the remote drip irrigation and with the growing list of plants i'll be putting in.

    And bill who likes bonsai I'll certainly post some pics. :p

    Peace,
    warren
     
  6. warren.cascade

    warren.cascade Junior Member

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    cister design?

    Soo, I guess i'll keep this post evolving with my plans. It's somehow comforting to know like minded folks are keeping an eye on each others projects to permacultralize the world:).

    After chatting with a permaculturalist from the Kalama, which is watershed just south of us on the Toutle, i'm questioning the 55 gallon drums connected together design.

    The NEW IDEa:
    Dig a somewhat small pond, 15' x 5' x 4', Line it with pond liner, and slide in a pipe with a gravity siphon to the drip line. Easy enough right?
    All the plants I'm wanting to water are all down hill from where I would build the pond, so that'll work fine. I guess I really don't know what i'm getting into by building a 'small pond' thou.

    So here's my brainstorm on problems and benefits of either system:

    cistern built with twenty-five 55 gallon drum connected together:
    Problems-
    1. breaking points with lots of small parts
    2. many points that could get clogged
    3. cost of fittings
    4. time retrofitting barrels

    Benefits-
    1. easily expanded once all the parts are assembled
    2. no legal issues
    3. build off site where all the tools are, and bring to site ready to put together
    4. more contained, and easier to adapt to a potable water system.

    small pond:
    problems-
    1. legality/liability?
    2. equating evaporation
    3. pond liner riping when coyote jumps in and losing water supply

    benefits-
    1. cheap
    2. good exercise
    3. less possibilities for breaking parts
    4. more rustic;-)


    All for now.
     
  7. mossbackfarm

    mossbackfarm Junior Member

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    Hi Warren

    The downside to a pond in our climate is evaporation...during the dry months, you'll lose an inch of water a week to the air, which means over 3 feet of water. That's a lot of digging!

    A 1550 gallon tank runs about $600...kindof steep, but it'd save lots of the fittings and such compared to the fleet of blue barrels. Depending on your source for those, it may work out cheaper and/or more versatile.

    An inbetween alternative could be the 275(?) gal liquid totes that the biodiesel folks use...craigslist tends to have them regularly

    Good luck

    Rich
     

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