Low-Flow Lawn Watering

About This Video
Check out two forms of low-flow irrigation that cut down on water usage and save you money!

Rate This Video	Saving Rating...
Overall Rating		(7)

Comments on "Low-Flow Lawn Watering "

Video Transcript for "Low-Flow Lawn Watering "

David Lupberger on Low Flow Irrigation: Hi, I'm David Lupberger with ServiceMagic.com. I'm with Craig Bowen, from "A Boulder Gardener", a full service landscape company and we're going to talk about irrigation.
Lupberger: Craig, when I've seen irrigation systems, I've seen in traditional sprinkler heads that I understand have a water flow of like 2 gallons per minute. Well, we're in an arid area, so I understand there are also some lo-flow irrigation options. Can you tell me a little bit more about that?
Craig Bowen/A Boulder Gardener: That's correct, and there are a few different kinds of low flow irrigation systems that you can use. There's in the ground low flow irrigation systems, which are called drip systems. And then above ground that are called mister systems, that you can incorporate drips on them too for trees and shrubs and plants that might need more water. But this is a great system right here, which is your basic mister head system that can mist over many different plants at once. And this just emits a small amount of water compared to a large sprinkler head that you've seen in traditional grass areas or large areas where you got the mister coming out.
Lupberger: So this is the above ground system and this will use a fraction of what traditional sprinkler head flows.
Craig Bowen/A Boulder Gardener: Exactly, and for an area like where we're at is ideal. You don't have as much water available to us and it's much better for an arid area like where we're at.
Lupberger: And where we're at you'll see there's no grass, so in this case we're looking at a system that is really made to use less water.
Craig Bowen/A Boulder Gardener: Absolutely
Lupberger: Okay, so how does this run? Is this on a timer, how does it work?
Craig Bowen/A Boulder Gardener: Well it's on a timer that comes out of your basic faucet out of the side of your house.
Lupberger: And then you just hook the system to the timer? Let's go see the timer.
Craig Bowen/A Boulder Gardener: Okay.
Lupberger: Okay Craig here is a sample of a drip system you were telling me about? Can you explain how it works?
Craig Bowen/A Boulder Gardener: Yes, absolutely. This is your main water line, that's going to all of your other plants and to your misters. Right here is a little adapter that is fitted onto what's called a tube. The spaghetti tube is then split, and then these emitters control the amount of water that is going to this tree right here. So these emitters will emit water directly into this tree for the roots, because this tree is going to need more water than any other small plant will need and that will help the tree survive and grow a lot healthier.
Lupberger: And so we've got 2 trees behind you, each of these trees have a drip system like this?
Craig Bowen/A Boulder Gardener: Correct, because in this area there is no other plants that need water, so we want to put the water directly into the roots of the tree. Your system is fed here, by the timer you can get at your local hardware store, and I've attached a Y valve here, so you can have your garden hose connected onto here. So you don't have to disconnect this every time you use your garden hose. And this is your valve and your valve is always on at this point.
Craig Bowen/A Boulder Gardener: Here is an example of a professionally installed timer. The advantage of this timer right here is it can run multiple zones at different times of the day. Another advantage of this system is that it shuts off when it's raining. So you're not irrigating unnecessarily. So in short, timers with misters and a drip system can save you a lot of time, water and money.