John Weiland

More academic experience than practical--oats for sure are good hosts for mycorhizal colonization which will benefit your soil.  Additionally, the roots of oat produce avenicins which are compounds known to suppress certain disease-causing fungi.  So you will get a multiple benefit here from the organic matter, soil conditioning, mycorhizal build-up and disease suppression from an oat cover crop.

Judith Browning wrote: .........Have had to turn down the pressure with the valve Steve placed just outside the pumphouse in order to water without blasting the soil out from under the plants.
I think I'll be able to figure out a watering schedule that will be more efficient soon.

If I just focus on things in that 75 foot area I can keep them watered well with the hose.

I showed Steve the photo of the on/off switch...he wants one 😊

As noted elsewhere, many pumps will be able to shut off completely if the pressure in the hose gets too high.....like if you had a shut-off at the end of the hose and turned it to fully closed.  The pump that we both have I don't think has this although it may be able to accept such a modification if one desired.  I'm still not clear from this pump or my other gas-powere model if there is any harm done to the impeller or seals if it's trying to pump against a closed hose.  But that said, I've always tried to maintain some flow in the system when the pump is running just to ensure there is no time for it to run dry.  In the meantime, I will use the hose unblocked for much of the watering, but will occasionally place thumb partially over the opening to get a bit more spray for certain tasks.  And yes, so nice that the on/off switch can be placed either near the pump or near the power outlet based on one's needs.

Had another good watering this morning as still no *dependable* rain in the forecast.  Solar fixtures now trickling in in the mail so that I can rejuvenate the batteries without using home power.  Glad to see this is all coming together for you guys!

Tereza Okava wrote:Everyone knows the only way to cure an earworm is with a bigger, badder earworm.

Only the most intrepid and fearless will dare to click on this link!!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2TfWo3GsIII

And it's not anywhere near "the Season"!.......  Don't even go there, Tereza, you know how this ends...'It's a fool's game'...  (Doh!....why did you bring up Bonnie Tyler!)

[...nevermind, now that 'Windy' is crawling around in there for the rest of the day!.... :-) ]

...at least none of you has the theme song to the "The Patty Duke Show" in your heads!!!.....


....ooops


;-)

Judith Browning wrote:.....We decided to stick with the 25' limit for this pump but now wonder if we could have got away with another 5 feet and get a little deeper in the well where it replenishes faster?

Again, I'm not well schooled in this aspect of hydrological engineering, but I would just go ahead and add an extra 5 ft to your suction hose and see what happens.  I don't suspect it will damage the pump to try....if it's too much distance, it just won't be able to lift the water to the pump impeller.  As long as you prime the pump with water at the start, you won't be testing this 'dry'.  You've noted that you are getting ample water as it is currently set up, but that you may be draining down the water level faster than it can replenish thereby causing the reduced flow later on.  By going that extra 5 ft deeper, I suspect you may drop your flow rate a bit, but be in an area of the well that will give you either faster replenish rate or at least a larger starting volume as you begin to pump.  So this now is just what I would try, but can't say that from a point of view of deep experience with such matters.  Hopefully others with greater understanding can chime in.  Are you able to monitor the surface of the well-water with a flashlight?  If you can actually see that the volume of the well is being depleted to the point where the footvalve of your suction hose/pipe is being exposed, that would help in solving this problem.  But if you can observe the loss in flow rate again and see that the footvalve is still *below* the surface water level, then I would suspect something else is affecting the system.  Hopefully some ideas to try here.  It's been a real benefit with the continuing drought to have this option in our own gardening....the river has not dropped further in about 2 weeks, so what is there must be largely spring-fed at this point.

Hopefully some one can address the possibility of the well needing to be replenished as that is something I would not have experience with.....would be surprised though if the reservoir down there was that small in volume.

One possibility if your footvalve is installed is clogging of the screen by sandy sediment.  If it were mud, any clogging would likely stay put on the screen and you probably would not get much pumping to occur even after a few hours of waiting.  However, if it is loose sediment, the suction action would pull the sediment onto the filter screen and slow the water flow down to a trickle.  Then when pump is turned off, suction is gone and sediment slowly falls off he screen.  This allows you to start up a few hours later and get water before the screen clogs again.  *If* this is the case, I hope someone can chime in with a solution.......I don't know if there is some kind of large surface area 'prefilter' available that may allow good flow while protecting your footvalve screen from sediment??....  As far as vacuum leak, they likely would be evident right away and you wouldn't have any flow to fill the buckets, even at the beginning.

Anyway, sounds like you are off to a good start!

There's a lot scattered around the forum on using batteries and inverters for both stationary and mobile electrical power production and what I'm about to add may have already been addressed elsewhere, perhaps even in the videos in this thread.  Since it seems that there is still a mix of legacy lead-acid and other batteries powering the different configurations here and because of recently experiencing an aspect of battery-inverter connection that is more pronounced and/or more of a concern with lithium batteries (and in the future, potentially other batteries that utilize a battery management system (BMS)), I'm posting this here.  Please refer to the link   https://permies.com/t/179996/Sprinkler-pumps-shallow-pumps-irrigation   for my introduction into using some newer 12V LiFePO4 batteries to run a booster pump for garden watering.

In the past, using a 100 Ah 12V lead-acid deep cycle battery and a 1500W modified sine wave inverter, I had grown accustomed to making inverter to battery connections and experiencing a mild spark at the battery post when making the final connection, quite similar to that when attaching a car battery under the hood.  It appears from having perused many videos now that this spark, when dealing with lower voltage batteries and inverters, is relatively inconsequential and not harming to either the battery or the inverter.  Once all cables are attached, proceed as usual.  Thus my concern recently when I first attached a newer 12V 100Ah LiFePO4 battery with a 3000W 12V pure sine wave inverter...and experienced quite a dramatic spark with the initial contact.  Subsequent contact was fine....and I've since learned that this is due to having 'pre-charged' the capacitors in ther inverter.  The greater spark was due to larger capacitors in the larger 3000W inverter.  The fix for this is all over YouTube and in different forms.  Essentially, the spark is from the capacitors demanding full in-rush current from your battery when you touch the cable to the pole:  By placing a resistor of sorts beween the battery post and the cable going to the inverter, that rush of current is reduced and no substantial spark occurs.  It's a bit vague what to use as the resistor, but alternatively many will use a 12V automobile incandescent battery to serve as the 'resistor'--when the connection is made, the light illuminates and fades rather quickly, signifying that current has passed through the bulb to fill the capacitors, but once filled, they do not discharge back towards the battery.  Once complete....over only several seconds....the connections can safely be made.  The point is driven home that the spark is not necessarily trivial.  It can cause tiny fragments of hot battery post to spit off towards you, so hand, arm, and face/eye protection is recommended if doing for the first time.  If this already has been addressed in (a) past posts, please feel free to disregard. Hope this of use to others.....and if interested in more, search on the terms "battery inverter capacitor pre-charging".

I find left-over chickepeas, either canned or from fresh cooking, will freeze pretty well for storage.  I've used them for soups and hummus/falafel to good-enough satisfaction.  Looks like Montana is the #1 producing state in the US right now so for 'eating local' at Wheaton Labs, no different than picking berries up the ridge! :-)  Ha!     .....Great little legume!

Chance Lunceford wrote:

Ac Baker wrote:I've got two fruits from the box which are pale, filling their husk to splitting.  

So I'm hoping they're ripe as I don't know anyone growing them near me.

Those're your best bet. Give them a go.

Agreed.   We are near the Canadian border in central US and have quite warm summers, but a short growing season and quite cold winters (common to have temps -30C or below).  We never plant tomatillos as the garden is full of volunteers each year....more like a weed actually.  So my wife chooses which 'patch' to save and they grow very well through the summer.  Fruits produced are ~2.5 - 3 cm in diameter and are eaten after the transition from green to yellow color. At this stage, the surface of the fruit is almost a bit sticky, but they are higher in sugar at this stage than green fruits.  Good luck!

Kara Ann,   I went to school for a spell at Evergreen State College but that was a while ago and can't help with the referrals to a solar well installer.  However, I did notice through some sleuthing at their campus website that there is now a community organization in Olympia called 'Olympia Community Solar' --  Since you may be located not far from Olympia, those within that organization may know of installers who would be able to advise you if nothing shows up here in this thread.  Beautiful area there on the Penninsula....Good luck!

Link for the website:   https://olysol.org/