Drip Irrigation Systems

As mentioned yesterday we also use drip irrigation systems (drip) on Puterbaugh Farms. Any new acreage that we plant has drip. There are numerous benefits to using drip in the baby hop yards. With the drip systems we only run our water sets between 2-4 hours once every other day when temperatures are cooler, sometimes we run them daily when the temperature pushes toward triple digits. All of our drip systems are equipped with timers so that the valves change automatically from one to the next. In theory, this would save time, but we still have to keep a watchful eye on our pumps to make sure there is still water flowing. A three hour set, on a timer, without water is useless. Currently we are running four separate pumps with timed systems.

The ability to put fertilizer directly into the water right after it exits the pump is priceless for raising the baby hops. We are able to calculate our fertilizer application with great precision and do not have to use a tractor to apply it. This is not an option in traditional ditches.

In a nutshell we cut the watering time from 36 hours in a traditional ditch system to 2-4 hours with drip and we no longer have to stand there with a shovel all the time. On top of this we can enter the hop yards at any time with a tractor instead of having to wait until the fields dry out enough to run tractors through them.

Drip line running down row of baby Centennials.

Mature hop yard with drip being watered, notice how dry the middle of the row is compared to fields having ditches.

Valve assembly with timer on top.

Close up of timer, this one runs a 3.5 hour set from 11:30 AM to 3:00PM.

Water box in foreground with a pair of pumps and sand filters the large round steel objects, fertilizer unit on the far right.