How Speeding Up Hand Watering Can Help Save on Labor
October 18, 2023 Time management in the greenhouse is always a paramount concern. With nationwide labor shortages affecting every industry, it is important to optimize the efficiency of day-to-day greenhouse operations.
There are many ways to automate irrigation, for example; however, there are other simple, cost-effective solutions that can be implemented first. Choosing the right watering tools can have a major impact on irrigation labor. By choosing high-flow waterbreakers, valves, and hoses, watering time can be drastically cut down.
A recent blog post from Dramm highlights how different waterbreakers supply different flow rates based on the number of holes within the output of the nozzle. Fewer, larger holes means a higher volume of water in a shorter period of time.
However, increasing flow rate is a careful balance. While a higher flow nozzle will allow you to water plants faster, the increased volume will result in larger droplets. This is often too harsh for early stage growing. Once plants mature, they have the strength to endure a higher flow and a root system that requires more water. Making the switch at this stage is key to improving watering efficiency.
Watering equipment is like tools in a tool box. Different tools will work best for different jobs. Optimizing the use of those tools in the right way can save you both time and labor.
If you decide to implement higher flows within your watering, water saturation time also needs to be considered. Different plants and media require different volumes of water to reach an ideal level of saturation. After changing your flow rate, reaching this point will require a shorter amount of time. Thus, it is important to reevaluate how long each plant needs to be irrigated. This watering period can be easily determined by measuring out different volumes of water over varied durations of time. Then water separate pots with the different measurements to determine the ideal volume and watering interval.
Learn more in the original post here.
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