Irrigation made easy

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When the rain doesn't come, a low-cost drip irrigation system will save you time and use about half as much water as conventional sprinkler irrigation.

Hand over that Hose

Although it may seem very satisfying to water by hand, if you dig into the soil when you're finished you will find only the top inch or so is wet. Most of us don't have the patience or time to water properly by hand. Giving a 20x3-foot vegetable bed the inch or more of water it needs during the heat of summer would leave you holding the hose for almost a half an hour (assuming your hose can deliver 2 gallons per minute). Even if you had the patience required, the water flows so fast, much of it runs off along the soil's surface rather than sinking in.

Using a sprinkler also has several disadvantages compared to drip irrigation. Sprinkling increases the spread of plant diseases, especially if you water in the evening when leaves have less chance to dry off quickly. Sprinkler irrigation also uses more water than drip irrigation, wastes water on weeds in the rows and creates muddy paths. Your best bet is drip irrigation. —Steve Reiners, Ph.D., associate professor of horticultural sciences, Cornell University.

:The best fertilizer may be the footsteps of the farmer, as the Chinese proverb says. But all of the fertilizer and shoe leather in the world won't raise so much as a hill of beans without water.

Just ask anyone who farms in the desert, in places like Israel, southern California and southeastern Pennsylvania, where my family and I raise about four acres of certified organic vegetables, cut flowers, herbs and blueberries.

Normally we receive about 40 inches of rain annually (sometimes followed by brilliant rainbows like the one shown at left.) The trouble is we haven't received anything close to normal rainfall in more than a year. Most areas in Pennsylvania now face the worst drought in recorded history. And this comes right on the heels of worst drought in 100 years, which occurred only three years ago. Whether we blame it on global warming, the greenhouse effect, El Nino or La Nina, the harsh reality is drought emergencies have been declared in Pennsylvania in five of the last seven years.

State and federal agriculture officials are urging cash grain farmers to purchase crop insurance. As organic market gardeners, our farm is not eligible for the program. Instead we've invested our hard-earned cash into the best crop assurance we know: drip irrigation equipment.