When it comes to the issue of water conservation in the United States, landscaping takes center stage. This is because such a large percentage of the country’s water supply, especially in urban areas, is used for landscape irrigation. In light of this, many states and municipalities are urging homeowners and businesses to take a more responsible approach toward conserving water in the landscape. Sometimes this comes in the form of education. In many cases, it comes as legislation.

“The key to growth in low-volume irrigation is education,” says Dave Abrams, president of Aquarius Brands, Inc., in Ontario, California. “It’s a 40-year-old start-up technology. As an industry, in an effort to provide ultimate flexibility, we have offered contractors and consumers too many choices. There are no standards, many products are not interchangeable between manufacturers, and when you go into a big box retailer, the presentation is confusing; so consumers get turned off. Simplifying choices and educating the consumer about low-volume irrigation will be the key to long-term success of this technology in the landscape market.”

It seems that just about every state extension service and conservation department is educating citizens on the principles of “xeriscaping,” landscaping to achieve maximum water efficiency. Key among these principles is efficient watering with an emphasis on low-volume irrigation.

Low-volume irrigation, including drip irrigation and micro-irrigation, is the process of delivering controlled amounts of water slowly and at low pressure, directly to the root zone of plants. This practice has been in widespread use in agriculture for many years. In recent years, however, conservation education, irrigation restrictions, and soaring water bills have brought this technology into the landscaping industry where it is now thriving.

Photo courtesy: Antelco

“One of the biggest forces we’re seeing now is water restriction,” says Jennifer Waxman Loyd, marketing analyst for Antelco Corporation in Longwood, Florida. “Contractors who haven’t already been installing micro-irrigation systems are being forced to do so.”

This is exactly what happened to Longboat Key Maintenance, a landscape and maintenance firm near Sarasota, Florida. “We started using low-volume irrigation within the last five to seven years,” says Ron Dewick, irrigation manager. “We had to because of watering restrictions. On Longboat Key, we were restricted to watering one day per week, and then only for certain hours of the day. This is becoming very typical on the west coast of Florida.” Because micro-irrigation uses dramatically less water than traditional overhead watering, these systems are typically exempt from watering restrictions. This was the case on Longboat Key. Moving away from conventional watering quickly became a no-brainer.

In some areas, legislation goes one step further by prohibiting the installation of any irrigation systems that are not low volume. “Water management districts are basically telling people, ‘Just because you can buy that water doesn’t mean you have the right to waste it with inefficient irrigation.’” says Mike Stoll, marketing manager for the Landscape and Turf Division of Netafim, Inc., in Fresno, California.

LEED certification standards are also having an impact. Developed by the U.S. Green Building Council, the LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) Green Building Rating System is a national standard for high performance, sustainable buildings. LEED ratings include a water efficiency category and specifically target landscape irrigation. Needless to say, drip irrigation scores above overhead systems. There is a growing list of city, state, and federal government entities that require new construction projects to achieve set LEED ratings. People who design and install low-flow are poised to respond.

But there’s another, more fundamental trend pushing irrigation professionals toward low-volume systems: consumer demand. “Homeowners and property managers are taking a much more active role in selecting irrigation products than they used to,” says Stoll. “In previous years, they would typically just say ‘I want an irrigation system,’ and their contractor would put it in. Now, they’re doing their own research. There’s a strong interest among consumers to cut down on water usage, not only for financial reasons, but because it’s the right thing to do.”

Go Green... Really Green
We all know that using water more efficiently is the green thing to do in the environmental sense. But if planned correctly, drip irrigation systems can also produce landscapes that are far greener and more luxuriant than ever.

Drip systems green up the landscape by giving each plant exactly the amount of water it requires. Rather than the one-size-fits-all approach of overhead watering, micro-irrigation gives each plant the optimum amount of water delivered in a way that suits its specific needs. In addition, drip systems don’t deliver water to areas between plantings, so weed growth can be dramatically reduced.

Photo courtesy: Maxijet

“Low-volume systems will typically grow a plant to maturity in about half the time, with half the water, and about a seventy percent reduction in weeds,” says Stoll.

Ron Dewick has noticed the difference. “I found that I simply have healthier plants with this kind of system,” says Dewick, who uses micro-sprays, a series of mini-sprinklers that deliver a low-volume spray to a limited area. “It’s also a lot easier on the plants than an overhead system. It doesn’t beat the plants with a hard course spray. With micro-irrigation, we can put the water right at the root zone and it doesn’t damage the leaves.”

That’s the beauty of micro-spray, according to Susan Thayer, president of Maxijet and Mister Landscaper in Dundee, Florida. “You can choose different components to direct water exactly where you want it. Some plants really like their leaves wet; some don’t. With micro-spray, you can give each plant the moisture it needs exactly where it wants it, and yet you’re using a lot less water.”

“It’s almost like magic,” says Thayer. “When you first put the system into a new planting area, it’s really beautiful to see the gentle spray. Then you come back in a couple of months and the plants are always lush, always perky, like they look after a nice gentle rain. It’s very rewarding.”

Designers also like it for the incredible flexibility micro-irrigation provides. It’s harder to manage curves and tight spaces with conventional systems. But the flexible tubing and components of drip irrigation allow for beds of just about any shape imaginable.

So many choices…
Micro-sprinklers are just one kind of emission device used in low-volume irrigation. Others include drip tape, drip emitters, jets, bubblers, and more. There is tremendous product variety within these general categories. Choosing the right product for the particular application is one of the most important factors in the success of your project.

“You really have to know the needs of the plants you’re working with,” says Janet Reilly, marketing manager in the Landscape Drip Division for Rain Bird, Inc., in Glendora, California. “In a traditional system, all of the plants typically get the same amount of water -- some get too much and some get too little. In a drip system you can target each plant and give it exactly what it needs. But to do that, you have to really know the plants, and know what each product does.”

Photo courtesy: Aquarius Brands

The wide array of available emitters can seem confusing to a contractor who hasn’t actually used them yet. However, Reilly points out that any confusion over the emitters and their uses sorts itself out quickly. “Once you do this a few times and become familiar with the products, it’s really not complicated.”

Dewick agrees. “I’ll be honest,” he says, “with the first one or two installs, you need to spend some time learning the tricks. You learn which parts are easiest to use, which ones work with each application and how to install them. After that, it’s fairly simple.”

Because drip irrigation systems require low volume and low pressure, they also include components for pressure regulation and filtration. These additional components, combined with the staggering array of available emitters, have sometimes given drip irrigation a reputation for being overly complex. This reputation is unwarranted, according to Larry Gross, general manager of Sunshine Nurseries in Riverside, California.

“One of the biggest mistakes people make is designing something that’s more complicated than it needs to be and more complicated than is appropriate for the application,” says Gross. “The more complicated it is, the more room you have for error.”

With drip irrigation, every design is going to be unique; it will involve a different layout using different plants with different needs. However, within those variables, contractors will find quite a bit of room for replication. “Redundancy is the key to success,” laughs Gross. “If you find a basic design that works well for you and a set of components that work well for you, stick with them and develop expertise with that system. This will remove a lot of the guesswork.”

While learning to design and install micro-irrigation systems is not difficult, contractors do need to take some front-end time to educate themselves in order to make sure their projects succeed.

“There are three factors for success in drip irrigation,” says Travis Komara, president of Salco Products in Rancho Cucamonga, California. “Quality of the design, quality of the product, and quality of the installation. If you’re missing one of these three, it’s not going to work. But if you have them all, it will work beautifully.”

Fortunately, manufacturers will bend over backward to provide contractors with a complete understanding of how to design and install successful systems, and how to choose the right emitters for each job.

“Education is critical to the success, not only of the contractor, but of drip irrigation itself,” says Komara. “Contractors have to be knowledgeable about drip because they need to help educate municipalities. Sometimes, when areas experience drought conditions, there can be a knee-jerk reaction. Legislation is passed and new systems are installed without a commitment to the expertise necessary to develop good systems that last. It’s important for contractors to become familiar with this technology before legislation forces the issue. Not only will they be ready to take advantage of new opportunities, but they can also make sure that municipalities get the guidance they need.”

Larry Gross agrees. “Unfortunately, some cities have been turned off by drip irrigation. They’ve tried a bad version and they’ve abandoned it. That’s one of the reasons it’s so important to get the right products, the right controls, and the right design. Projects that have all of this are highly successful for municipalities, and they stick with them.”

Saving Green
Whether you’re dealing with a homeowner or a municipality, the bottom-line decision about what irrigation system to purchase almost always comes down to – well, the bottom line. This is where micro-irrigation really shines.

Photo courtesy: Rain Bird

Cost savings can be huge. “When you’re overhead watering, you’re watering 100 percent of the area,” says Larry Gross. “With drip irrigation, in a typical bed you’re only watering about 30 percent of that area and you aren’t losing any of it to runoff or evaporation. When we talk to a potential client, we can look them in the eye and tell them we’ll save at least 70 percent on their water usage. That’s what we tell them, but we know the savings will actually be much more than that.”

Take, for example, a project that Gross worked on for Riverside County in California. The county ran a comparison of the half-million square foot area that used the new drip system with an area of the same size using a conventional system. They found that the drip system used 95 percent less water than the overhead system.

While most of the savings come from reduced water consumption, there can also be a savings in equipment and installation, depending on the project. The components themselves are relatively inexpensive and can be easier to install than conventional systems. They don’t require trenching and are quickly hidden by mulch and the lush growth they create.

Drip systems are also easier to repair, says Gary Bailey, vice president of sales and marketing for Aquarius Brands. “The tools required are a pair of scissors or a knife, and in most cases, you can add additional emission devices without adding new valves and lines.”

Bailey also points out that the liability associated with wet sidewalks is eliminated with micro-irrigation. And that sounds good to every professional.

The future looks green
We all have a stake in conserving water. Contractors and consumers are recognizing this. In order for consumers to keep their landscapes green, and contractors to keep their business, we have to take a smarter approach to irrigation. Low volume is that smart approach. “Low volume is definitely the future of irrigation,” says Larry Gross. “It’s going on all around us now, and it’s only going to grow.”