Watering Technique

[Casscat]

I'm very confused as to the correct watering programme for my land. I have a wide variety of fruit and nut trees as well as more ornamental stuff nearer to the house. The land is on an irrigation system with drip hoses. Water is very scarce in my location, the grey water recycling is not all it could be and the town water can be off for several days at a time so I have to be frugal. My man who looks after the house says that the watering system should be turned on for 45-60 mins every other day, but other advice suggests a longer soak of 4hrs once a week so that the water can get down to the roots and not encourage the roots to move towards the surface in search of water. Which strategy is the best?? Some of my trees are not looking very healthy at the moment, although I do appreciate that at this time of year everything is a bit parched. If we were talking UK I'd probably opt for the longer soak but this is Andalusia and the normal rules do not apply.

[mujer]

We have generally watered every 4 days in summer.
This year was every 3 days for about 45 mins with the hot, dry weather.
This was the advice of local people too.
The trees seemed fine but have now boomed after the long overdue downpour.
We often lose at least 1 tree a year though.
Citrus like a good soak maybe once a week but 4 hours seems rather a lot.

[Martin Page]

My Irrigation is 30 mins a day every day at 6:00am .... this applies about 20L/m2 ....

So Time isn't the main Criteria ... output need also to be taken into account

[Casscat]

Thanks for the feedback mujer and Martin. It looks like shorter, more frequent watering is the method in Andalucia. I am trying to get the balance right between efficiency and plant care because I don't live on site and rely upon someone to look after the garden for me. The irrigation is not on a timer system so he has to go over and physically turn the watering system on and off. I hoped that one long soak once a week might be more efficient as he can go off and do something else for 3-4hrs whereas coming three or four times a week for 45 mins will mean he has to stay on the premises.

Citrus fruit is the main produce in the garden (well, after olives which are a cash crop) but there is also plums, pears, apples, nisperos, carob, persimmons and almonds as well as ornamental planting closer to the house itself. I don't want my trees to die from neglect although I know that nature will claim some of them regardless of what I do. When time and money permit I will try to introduce some automation, but the network of water deposits, wells and pumps is such that manual intervention will always be required to some extent because there's no point a timer telling the garden it's watering time if there is no water in the actual deposit. It's a steep learning curve for someone who is used to a small City garden, a Hoselock reel and a tap with constant running water!

[Wicksey]

Our garden sounds similar to yours Casscat and we do have 4 different irrigation systems set up as the land is terraced and we have one timer for each area. However, we found that the timers weren't always switching on/or off when they should so we turn them on and off manually now.

We tried different times for watering but find that if we left it on for 2 hours the water eventually ran off the land even though most trees do have wells around them to help the water puddle. We tend to do one hour a couple of times a week now.

It is difficult to gauge as we have a wide variety of plants and trees and they don't always need the same amount of watering and some of the fruit trees do seem to struggle a bit in the heat of the summer. (This summer we attached a hose to the pool pump and each time I backwash or hoover we use that water to irrigate the flower beds around the house which has worked quite well as we can control what gets more water.)

[Patricia 1of 2]

Over night watering can have the advantage of letting your trees/garden get the full benefit of the water before the heat of the sun evaporates it. Also a circle of old carpet laid upside down and placed around the base of the trees and shrubs will help reduce the evaporation and keep the soil moist. If you don't like that idea a good layer of bark mulch (4 inches) will do the same job and looks more attractive. I appreciate this might not be practicle in a large orchard but works really well around the garden.
Just some ideas.

[Campo Steve]

Wicket, have you lost any plants through using your pool wTer to irrigate? Some sites suggest the chlorine in the water can kill plants so I have avoided using it but if it is no problem then I'll may set up irrigation pipes to my pool water outlet.

[Martin Page]

Most plants round my pool don't have a problem with pool water irrigation.. the boarder where the backwash and vacuum to waste run out are the lushest part of my garden ....

Pool water is not recommended for pond life though ... it certainly kills fish !