If you are planning on taking gardening more seriously, you may realize that a lot of the costs start to add up. Drip irrigation is one way to combat that rising cost of gardening.
To maximize the profit, the investments are actually maximized. But among those maximized investments, one of the ways you can minimize the cost is Drip irrigation. There are many advantages of drip irrigation. We will discuss them briefly in this article.
Drip irrigation is the system of irrigation where the main focus is delivering maximum nutrients and water to root and lessening the amount of evaporation. These are the basic advantages.
There are lots more to talk and discuss.
Advantages of Drip Irrigation
Let’s make a list of the advantages at first, then I will discuss the important ones to make sure you understand them properly.
- Fertilizer and nutrient loss is lessened so the soil is full of necessary elements for your plants to grow
- Water management is highly efficient if you can do it properly
- Absolutely no necessity of field leveling
- Water can be recycled and used several times
- Moisture in root area can be maintained
- Soil erosion and weed growth is lessened
- The labor cost is less than other methods of irrigation
- Water distribution is equal to all plants
- Plant loss is minimized
These are the basic Advantages of Drip irrigation. Let’s discuss the important ones.
Fertilizer and Nutrients Loss control
The most dangerous thing for a plant is finding fewer nutrients in the soil. Due to unplanned and uneven irrigation, the soil loses a lot of nutrients and fertilizer can’t play its part properly. Thus, the whole growth of the plant is hindered.
Moreover, to make sure the plants grow properly, some apply more fertilizers. This increases the cost to grow a single plant. But drip irrigation makes sure that the soil holds the highest amount of fertilizers, nutrients, and moisture in the root area to help the plant grow properly.
In this way, the chances of plants to grow less and to die lessens. It increases the chance to maximize your profits with minimum efforts.
Water Distribution
Distribution of water is very important for every plant to grow equally. If the area of your garden is small, then you can just apply water at each plants’ root. But if you have a larger area, it’ll take a lot of time to manage water. Simple drip irrigation will solve your problem.
The best part is that drip irrigation ensures the moisture in every single plant’s root. Thus, every plant gets enough nutrients to grow properly. This type of water distribution ensures proper growth and proper nurture for every single plant in your garden bed.
Water Recycling
The idea of drip irrigation was basically introduced for less humid places. There, the water gets evaporated too quickly for the plants to absorb. That’s why they need direct access to water at their roots. But the worst part is when we irrigate our gardens or fields, we waste a lot of water. Maximum water gets absorbed to places where the roots are not present. And also, the water present on the exterior of the soil get evaporated.
It’s a complete waste of water. Normal irrigation can never ensure that we can save water while irrigating the soil. But Drip irrigation can. There’s a system called Watermatic irrigation. This system is specially designed to make sure that the water only reaches the roots and we can recycle the water for further and several uses.
Other drip irrigation systems can also save a lot of water, but if you want to maximize the savings and minimize the waste, the best way is the Watermatic system.
Labor cost
The usual type of irrigation is done using water pumps. Water pumps are quite expensive. They run on electricity, and they require quite a lot. So, maintaining a water pump for irrigation is very costly.
On the other hand, you can create drip irrigation systems by hand using recycled products like hose pipes, old automobile tires, etc. That means the cost is very little in comparison to the other types of irrigation systems.
You may think to install sprinklers and they will do the work, right? Wrong! Sprinklers also have a pump and they run on electricity. You cannot redirect the path of the sprinkled water to reach the roots only. So, the maximum amount of water gets scattered all over. But with the drip irrigation system, you can ensure the perfect direction for water to reach the roots of the plants.
Soil Erosion and Weed Growth
Two of the greatest enemies for plants are soil erosion and weed. Soil erosion is nothing you ask for. It happens if the roots are not strong enough to hold the soil together. If we can redirect the water, nutrients and fertilizer supply to the roots, they can be strong enough to hold the soil together. Thus, drip irrigation stops soil erosion.
Weeds grow when plants have more nutrients in the soil to spare. Due to unplanned random irrigation, the soil gets imbalanced in nutrients. Thus, unnecessary plants grow along with you planted plants. These weeds absorb the necessary nutrients for your plants from the soil. Your plants don’t get the nutrients they need. That’s how weed destroys your plants yet gardens.
But drip irrigation can maintain the direction of nutrients. The irrigation process directs the nutrients towards the roots only. Thus, they don’t get scattered and weeds don’t get to grow.
Finally…
These are the ways drip irrigation can help your plants to grow properly. The advantages of drip irrigation are many more. The list can get bigger, but these are enough to make a person understand why they should apply drip irrigation instead of normal irrigation process.
Who doesn’t want their plants to grow and business to flourish? Everyone does. So, if you want the same, my suggestion would be applying drip irrigation. They will minimize your costs and maximize profits.
Drip irrigation is something that doesn’t only make life easier, but helps in dealing with the water wastage caused by irrigation as well. It’s green and effective, and that’s why one should opt for it.