Irrigation Controllers: What’s the Best Controller for your Irrigation System?

[@brad4527]

I will be changing my rasied beds to the metal rasied beds next year hopefully I will have things set up by march. love your videos! Have you come up with any new tips on the Irrigation on the rasied beds ? Thank for doing what you !! Brad. NJ Any tips on preventing chipmunks from getting into rasied beds?

[@dripdepot]

I do actually have a tip that's not in one of the videos yet! This might have been well known to other folks, but using ferments (fermented food scraps, fermented liquids) can improve yields. I got this tip from a customer who grows commercially -- this year, he kept referring to running ferments through his fertilizer injector, so I had to ask. He injects fermented liquids right through his injector instead of traditional fertilizers (he no doubt uses some of those as well, but I hadn't heard of injecting ferments before). Smaller critters can definitely be an issue in a garden -- in my home garden, it's raccoons. Are they entering the beds through the bottom? If so, a wire mesh at the bottom of the bed can prevent this (burrowing up into the bed) entirely, from chipmunks and other burrowers. Chicken wire, hardware cloth and similar wire meshes work pretty good, just lay it out where the bed will go and place the bed on top -- you can use some landscape staples to hold it in place initially if you need, but after that the weight of the bed will keep it secure. At the top, wire cages and chicken wire (anything with a fine enough of a mesh) can help deter them from getting into the bed that way (unless they're unreasonably strong like Oregon raccoons) :)

[@GardeningwithDave]

Hey Adam! I rented a plot at a community garden that allows me to add a water timer and drip irrigation system. Do you have any recommendations on a budget system that I can showcase?

[@dripdepot]

Heck yeah Dave, happy to help with this! Ok, let's start with the system -- how big of a system are you looking to showcase here, and what type -- like, a couple raised beds, in-ground beds, etc? For the timer, is this system going to be running off a hose bib? If so, we can focus on the hose end timers (which will be much more budget friendly compare to a controller like these as well).

[@GardeningwithDave]

@@dripdepot Hey Adam, I have access to a hose bib with a 4-way splitter, and one slot is available for me. This water bib is about 20 feet away from my designated gardening plot. Ideally, I would like to hook up a garden hose and drip irrigation. As for the size of the garden, let’s just say I plan to maximize every inch possible, so I need to plan ahead for water pressure. We are not allowed to have trees, so I am thinking of several berry bushes, flowers, a few raised beds (8-10+ beds), and a tunnel trellis. I believe the size of my lot is 20 x 25 feet.

[@dripdepot]

​@@GardeningwithDave This is fantastic Dave -- I think if you focused on the parts that primarily go into our raised bed kits you could do it all that way. The 1/4" drip line in those kits is versatile and can handle everything you mentioned (and is even the preferred way). 1/4" drip line is also reasonably priced -- you could potentially lower the overall costs a bit by making your own dripline with 1/4" inline emitters, but the labor time would go up exponentially. Happy to run some cost comparisons on that with you to keep this budget friendly. You're on the right track planning ahead for pressure and flow now as well, it sounds like you'll be making the most of the space which means quite a few plants (a very good thing!). With that in mind, are you allowed to do a 2-outlet timer there? A 2-Outlet timer basically allows it to be a 2 zone system, and they're not budget breakers: www.dripdepot.com/hose-end-irrigation-timer-outlets-two That may not even be a concern though, let's first test the flow rate of the hose bib you'll be using to see about the likelihood you'll need to zone. All you need is a timer and a bucket -- time how long it takes to fill the bucket (even a 1 gallon jug can work) with water and then plug the numbers into the flow rate calculator here to get a good idea of its flow rate: www.dripdepot.com/irrigation-calculators Let me know what results you get -- while you're there, get an idea of its pressure as well. If you have a pressure gauge, use that, but if you don't that's ok, just let me know how the pressure "feels". If it feels like normal residential pressure, that should be enough information -- if it feels particularly strong or weak let me know :)

[@GardeningwithDave]

@@dripdepot thank you Adam 🙏

[@treemanog112]

“Mixed applications😎😎😶‍🌫️”