If you are interested in reducing water use while increasing yields or improving the look of your landscape, drip irrigation is the best choice for you and you should look into the benefits of drip irrigation. Drip irrigation delivers water and nutrients directly to the plant’s root zone; Drip irrigation increases yields while saving resources such as water, fertilizers, and energy.
Landscapers can save their customers money on water, fertilizers while improving the look of their landscape. As water and labor costs rise, more and more growers and landscapers are shifting to drip irrigation.
Here are a few benefits of drip irrigation:
Reduced Water Use
The number one reason to use drip irrigation is water savings. Users of drip irrigation apply just the right amount of water directly to the root zones. Water is not wasted by evaporation, runoff, or overspray, common to other forms of irrigation. Drip irrigation systems are often more than 90% efficient than spray, rotor, or flood irrigation which normally falls into the 35% to 50% efficient. Irrigation efficiency is the amount of water taken from the water source actually used by the crop or plant. A highly efficient system like drip irrigation takes water from a source and uses almost all the plants water. A spray system, for example, maybe only 45% efficient, meaning most of the water evaporates before it hits the ground or falls where the roots of the plants don’t reach. This is highly inefficient.
Improved Plant Health
Drip irrigation allows flexibility for water use when it is required. If you have various plants needing different amounts of water, you can easily customize drip irrigation to provide just the right amount of water for each plant. Other irrigation systems provide the same amount of water to all plants overwatering most of your plants. Overwatering plants contributes to plant disease.
Efficient Use Of Fertilizer
Typically, less nitrogen is needed when using drip irrigation. Because the drip system spoon feeds water to plants, less fertilizer reaches past the root zone. Fertilizers can be injected into the drip irrigation system and provide consistent nutrients to plants. This microdose with every irrigation is more successful than bi-weekly fertilization that often shocks the plants. Here is an excellent training session on nitrogen utilization.
Over Fertilizing plants can also cause a lot of issues, you can read this article here to see if your plants are over fertilized.
Drip Systems Are Flexible
Drip systems are adaptable to oddly-shaped fields and landscapes or those with uneven topography or soil texture. Drip systems, because they are literally more flexible, allows growers and landscapers to customize a system when needed easily. This often results in higher efficiency in systems. See a training on 10 Factors For A Good Ag Irrigation Design here.
Cost-Effective
Installation and maintenance of drip systems are almost always less than the other irrigation methods. Following a proper drip design, less labor is needed, and overall material cost is usually less.
Contractors and growers will see increased productivity and lower costs as a result. For landscape contractors, they can also position themselves as a company interested in saving water-attracting more customers.
Drip irrigation’s popularity will continue to grow as contractors and growers share drip irrigation benefits with others. Increased education and awareness are also key. You can view all the Jain Irrigation training series videos here. Drip irrigation’s role as a significant water-conserving irrigation method will continue to grow rapidly as more growers and landscapes experience drip irrigation’s benefits.