IMS provides sophisticated irrigation scheduling tools – but do you always apply the traditional 5mm or 20mm per day?
With the threat of ongoing drought conditions, is there any other advice?
The irrigation application depth depends on a number of factors. It may not be as simple as always applying 5mm (or typically 30 minutes run time) of solid set irrigation per day.
This Canterbury Farming article on page 26 of the January 2024 edition outlines some of the reasons why. It also contains some fixed grid irrigation specific comments and advice from the team at Primary Insight.
Is applying little and often suitable for your grass and crop root depth?
Is there a risk that the plant roots will remain at the top of the soil profile?
Is applying little and often suitable for your soil type and conditions?
Does the little and often make the grass and crops less drought tolerant?
El Nino conditions are forecast to continue to influence our weather. Irrigation NZ’s drought advice contains some really useful tips and reminders including to consider deficit irrigation.
Irrespective of the answer, with IMS you can preconfigure multiple irrigation schedules and easily change them from the website.
This gives you great flexibility to actively manage your solid set irrigation as the season progresses and conditions change.
There is more detail on irrigation scheduling in this article with other considerations here. Page 16 of the IMS user manual contains detailed help for implementing schedules in IMS.
Applying 5mm or 20mm per day is easily achieved with the IMS irrigation scheduling.