The water situation in Israel is very problematical. Water allocation for various groups of plants has been cut and costs are rising. At such a time, the first victims are sadly, ornamental gardens. Many garden plants and lawns are drying out. Owners of small gardens and condominiums will have to pay much more for watering the garden than was usual in the past. Therefore, one should check irrigation regimes, computerized irrigation systems, irrigation practices, and water amounts. In principle, the garden's irrigation system should be suited to the water requirements of the plant groups.
From the outset, it is advisable to design efficient and well-controlled irrigation systems that disperse water evenly using sprinklers and drippers. It is important to check the water distribution efficiency in each part of the garden.
What should you be checking?
Proper placement of the sprinklers - check the manufacturer's catalog for the recommended installation distances according to their type, nozzle diameter and water pressure in the line. The water dispensed by the sprinklers ought to cover the whole area, evenly.
Eliminate fences, pillars and other objects that obstruct the spray.
The water pressure in the sprinklers must be as close to uniform as possible. Significant differences in pressure at the top of the line to the that at the end of the line, cause the water to be distributed, unevenly.
Check pressure using a pressure gauge on the sprinklers themselves and check the required pressure level in the manufacturer's catalog.
One of the most serious issues facing the garden owner or the gardener is knowing and determining water consumption of different plants.
It is absolutely important and crucial to understand and to understand this matter. Especially in our part of the world.
It is possible to have a beautiful and blossoming garden even when you do not use large amounts of water.
The recent municipal laws require garden owners to use a limited amount of water for their gardens. And if you exceed that amount you will have to pay more.
So first of all, a head control unit should be installed. It should include a watering computer (timer) of good quality. The head control unit distributes water to the different sections of the garden. The garden, therefore, should be organized in a way where the plants that require similar quantities of water are grouped in the same area.
Then each watering line needs to be set to a suitable watering regime. That should include the intervals between irrigations and the volumes of water.
The amount of water your garden should receive depends on a few factors.
· The water consumption of the various plant groups, trees or lawn.
· The type of soil.
· The regulations for home-garden water consumption of your municipality or local council. (Mark)
Water consumption is determined by Israel's meteorological service in every region of the country. The calculations are published by the meteorological service.
The evaporating index is different for each group of plants. There are plants whose evaporation index and water consumption are high, such as lawns, annual flowers, and roses.
On the other hand, there are plants with a low evaporation index including some ground cover plants, shrubs, and trees.
It is also very important to accurately determine the intervals between waterings for different types of soil.
For sandy soils the best interval would be 5 days.
For light soils - 5 to 7 days.
For medium soils - 7 to 14 days.
For heavy soils - 10 to 21 days.
The formula for the right watering is this:
The volume of water in liters * the area size in square meters * evaporation index.
Proper and correct placing of drip pipes is crucial for watering. It must be done in accordance with the density of the plants in a given area of the garden.
Other factors are the type of soil and the drippers' flow rate. (Flow rate is the volume of water that each dripper emits per unit of time, such as "2 liters/hour" or "4 liters/hour, etc.
It is also important to establish the same flow rate in all the drip pipes and to use the same diameter of the distributing and watering pipes. A pressure regulator for the drip pipes lines should be installed at the watering head unit.
While planning the garden, it is important to group the plants with similar water consumption in the same area.
Although having said that, I'd like to mention that today in the market, there are drippers with different flow rates that are installed directly into the pipes.
The watered area of the garden must be measured exactly. Setting the watering regime without knowing this is mistaken.
If the area of the garden is larger than it was calculated, the plants will suffer from the lack of water and if the area is smaller, there will be waist of water.