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Food Forest Garden Irrigation Techniques

 
Posts: 17
Location: Washington state
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Hi all, I'm creating a public food forest-inspired garden in Central Washington state. (Roughly Zone 6 USDA Hardiness). My largest question is how do I irrigate this thing?? I'll be growing some native plants, but also many fruit trees/shrubs/vines/groundcover/herbs. It's on flat land, we get minimal precipitation in the growing months, and we have access to irrigation canal/city water in abundance. Ideally I could dig swales, and gravity feed or flood the area, but I don't think either of those is possible given the flat and sandy soil. At this point I'm resorting to using drip irrigation on timers. If y'all think this is the best strategy, the second question is, what kind of drip irrigation materials to use? I would ideally create a twisty curvy garden that has more rounded pathways with guilds of plants in between, but that presents a challenge with how to run irrigation lines that way.  The other option is to do relatively straight rows and run irrigation along those. What is everyones thoughts on this, and perhaps what kinds of irrigation materials would you suggest using? Thank you.
 
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Location: Bendigo , Australia
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Sean, channels in sandy soil do not work, they leak.
Drip irrigation is very good, and I would encourage you to fit disc water filters to the system.
They prevent blockage and can be easily washed clean.
Irrigation lines will go anywhere, but make sure you have complete loops, not branch lines, the water pressure in the lines will be higher and more even.
Make sure you have adequate sized lines, many people have them too small.
 
John C Daley
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Location: Bendigo , Australia
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You may need to consider air valves if you have a gravity fed system that goes up and down.
Air can get trapped in the rises and block flow.
 
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