Lawn Irrigation Water Damaging Trees and Shrubs?

   / Lawn Irrigation Water Damaging Trees and Shrubs?
  • Thread Starter
#21  
I think you're vastly overwatering and drowning some of the roots. I can't imagine what running a well pump over 200 hours a month is doing to your electric bill.

For starters, I'd suggest to cutting back to once a week instead of 3-4 times a week.


Looks like average rainfall for that area is about half of your goal of 4"/mo. I'm thinking the plants just can't take it all in.
You may be right. Will try backing it off to every third day and see what happens.

You mentioned that you don't ever water once the grass etc is established. What part of the country do you live in and what is your annual rainfall?

I'm still wondering about the buildup of minerals in the well due to the filter backflushing all these years rather than passing the bad stuff on thru the sprinklers on a continual basis with no filter.
 
   / Lawn Irrigation Water Damaging Trees and Shrubs? #22  
I have seen odd things like this and got the best results calling a local university with turf and ag departments and getting their opinion and advice. These guys have seen it all and it saved me a lot of trial and error.
 
   / Lawn Irrigation Water Damaging Trees and Shrubs? #23  
You may be right. Will try backing it off to every third day and see what happens.

You mentioned that you don't ever water once the grass etc is established. What part of the country do you live in and what is your annual rainfall?

I'm still wondering about the buildup of minerals in the well due to the filter backflushing all these years rather than passing the bad stuff on thru the sprinklers on a continual basis with no filter.
I live in an area which is typically wet from November through March, and bone dry (like 12-18% humidity) from mid-May through October.
We water fruit trees *some*, and no other trees get watered; we do have flowers and herb bushes that get watered, but it's definitely nowhere near inches per week even.

There were a few years that even the (established) fruit trees didn't get any water, and while it affected fruit quality, the trees didn't care. Not watering newly planted / unestablished trees of of course is a great way to kill them.

I agree with the too-much-water; ground-level root plants typically need some water (especially grasses that are getting mowed and having their water loosed to the air) but anything with roots going a couple feet or more down probably don't need water nearly as much if at all. I'm just curious as to why half of your tree is red and half is green, though without looking at the trunks and roots anything's just conjecture.
 
   / Lawn Irrigation Water Damaging Trees and Shrubs?
  • Thread Starter
#24  
I live in an area which is typically wet from November through March, and bone dry (like 12-18% humidity) from mid-May through October.
We water fruit trees *some*, and no other trees get watered; we do have flowers and herb bushes that get watered, but it's definitely nowhere near inches per week even.

There were a few years that even the (established) fruit trees didn't get any water, and while it affected fruit quality, the trees didn't care. Not watering newly planted / unestablished trees of of course is a great way to kill them.

I agree with the too-much-water; ground-level root plants typically need some water (especially grasses that are getting mowed and having their water loosed to the air) but anything with roots going a couple feet or more down probably don't need water nearly as much if at all. I'm just curious as to why half of your tree is red and half is green, though without looking at the trunks and roots anything's just conjecture.
The part of the shrub that is "red" is where the water spray from the sprinkler was hitting it.
 
   / Lawn Irrigation Water Damaging Trees and Shrubs? #25  
Agree with others you are watering a 1/2 acre way too much, it needs maybe 2 times a week 40 minutes per zone which for a 1/2 acre should be 5-6 zones with 5-6 heads per zone. Also install a rain sensor $20 or so that shuts the system off if enough rain has fallen (they use expandable cork that swells when wet, and shrinks as it dries out).

The red usually indicates iron in the water, test the water and PH as others have said, and put a check valve in before the strainer filter.

Technically if every thing is tight no leaks to the first valve from the pump, you should get no leak back into the well.
 
   / Lawn Irrigation Water Damaging Trees and Shrubs?
  • Thread Starter
#26  
Applying an inch of moisture to 20K sqft requires 12,500 gallons of water. The well puts out about 10 GPM or 600 GPH so takes about 20 hours to put down that inch of moisture.
Agree with others you are watering a 1/2 acre way too much, it needs maybe 2 times a week 40 minutes per zone which for a 1/2 acre should be 5-6 zones with 5-6 heads per zone. Also install a rain sensor $20 or so that shuts the system off if enough rain has fallen (they use expandable cork that swells when wet, and shrinks as it dries out).

The red usually indicates iron in the water, test the water and PH as others have said, and put a check valve in before the strainer filter.

Technically if every thing is tight no leaks to the first valve from the pump, you should get no leak back into the well.
Two times a week with six zones and forty minutes per zone would be 480 minutes which, at 10 gallons/minute would be 4800 gallons.
It takes about 12,500 gallons to put down an inch of moisture on 20K sqft. and much more considering losses to overlap of the radial patterns.

I've always based watering times on 12 hours to do a large circle of, say, 40' radius to put down an inch of moisture. I've checked this with a rain gauge or pan several times over the years and, of course, it depends on nozzle size, pressure, evaporation etc. So I base my run time per zone and scheduled times per week on this to get the 1" of moisture that most horticulturalist recommend during the hot summer months. Overlapped areas do get more moisture.
 
   / Lawn Irrigation Water Damaging Trees and Shrubs? #27  
To be honest, an inch of moisture sounds like a flood to me. I can see an inch of moisture on some plants here and there, expecting that it's going to seep into the ground and wet a lot of other area around it, but broadcasting an inch regularly is asking for roots to drown.

Nothing we water here gets remotely that much water, and it's 80 at night and 95 in the day with 15% humidity max.
 
   / Lawn Irrigation Water Damaging Trees and Shrubs? #28  
Out of curiosity do you use a timer to water and what time of day do you water?
 
   / Lawn Irrigation Water Damaging Trees and Shrubs?
  • Thread Starter
#29  

An excerpt from the above:

Proper Watering

Proper watering is key to prolonging the health and color of your lawn. The problem with watering is that unless you have an irrigation system, most people are unable or unwilling to use the amount of water it takes to water their lawn properly. Watering is a big commitment in both time and money. Tall Fescue requires a significant amount of water during the summer. Your grass needs 1-1.5 inches of water per week. Whatever does not come from natural sources like rain, will need to be made up with supplemental irrigation. For example: a 2,000 square foot yard with average drainage, would need over 1,300 gallons of water per week.

It may be difficult to apply that much water to your grass at one time. Also you run the risk of run off and wasted water. A better option may be to divide your watering into 2 or 3 days during the week, making sure to achieve the total of 1 – 1.5 inches of water per week.

You guys are trying to kill my poor Fescue! :)

The shrub, which "was" the original subject of this thread, has since taken a turn for the worse and I'm now thinking that it wasn't the water spray from the sprinkler that damaged the leaves as seen in the photo at the start of the thread. The rest of this 40 year old Burning Bush is looking sick and I'm thinking its dying a natural death. That, or the negative 20F we experienced last Winter here in Kansas has also severely damaged or killed many other shrubs but showed the effects earlier this Spring.
 
   / Lawn Irrigation Water Damaging Trees and Shrubs?
  • Thread Starter
#30  
To be honest, an inch of moisture sounds like a flood to me. I can see an inch of moisture on some plants here and there, expecting that it's going to seep into the ground and wet a lot of other area around it, but broadcasting an inch regularly is asking for roots to drown.

Nothing we water here gets remotely that much water, and it's 80 at night and 95 in the day with 15% humidity max.
I'm envious of that "15% humidity max". We start off each summer day with about 85% and may get down to 35% in the afternoon if we're lucky. The lawn is always wet in the morning but the moisture evaporates rather quickly when the sun and breeze (if we're lucky" hits it.
 
 
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