Irrigation: Providing Water for Plant Growth in Arid Areas - Essay Sample

Introduction

Water is one of the essential requirements for the healthy existence of both plants and animals. Unfortunately, certain areas usually experience insufficient rainfall or have fewer water sources such as rivers, lakes, and many others. Therefore, people have had to come up with effective ways of ensuring water gets to the plants in such areas through irrigation. Irrigation involves harnessing of both ground and surface water and supplying it to the farms with plants using a variety of means to boost plant growth and enhance productivity. Factors that make the irrigation process necessary include the nature of rainfall, requirement of a certain threshold of water amounts for individual cops, and nature of the soil that gets applied for farming activities, just to mention a few. The paper focusses on the irrigation of a ten-acre garden with permanent sprinklers and the construction of the sprinkler, wells, their installation, and the prices of various components.

Is your time best spent reading someone else’s essay? Get a 100% original essay FROM A CERTIFIED WRITER!

Save 25%

The continuous advancement in the civilization of man has led to the invention of various means of irrigation. Different types of irrigation such as drip, sprinkler, center pivot, subsurface, and canal or surface irrigation have emerged depending on the means of irrigation and the applied technology (Al-Adili, Mohammed, & Alwash, 2017). Such variances got brought by the different physical conditions, the altitude of the region, and sources of water applied in various parts of the world. For instance, canal irrigation gets applied in plain areas with the supply of surface water, such as rivers. In contrast, subsurface irrigation gets supplied with water from the wells whose depth depends on the chemical quantities of the farm soil.

Construction of Sprinklers and Wells

Sprinkler irrigation makes use of sprinklers and water wells. While the water wells act as the reservoir for the water applied in the irrigation process, the sprinklers provide a means of delivering the water to the crops, landscapes, or golf courses. Firstly, some sprinklers deliver water in a manner that resembles the falling rainwater droplets. Such sprinklers get made up of upright pipes, and several nozzles joined to the top of the vertical conduit at regular intervals. Depending on the construction of the top nozzles, various types of sprinklers, such as traditional spray, drip, and rotor systems have emerged. The traditional spray systems have stationary nozzles designed to spray water within a complete circular area, making it necessary to have several of them for a single farm. The construction of drip sprinklers is similar to the traditional sprinklers. However, water is released slowly in the former as compared to the latter. Lastly, the rotor system sprinklers usually have the heads fitted with electric motors that enable their spinning through 360 degrees while sprinkling water around (Al-Adili et al., 2017). The soaker sprinklers are made of the horses with small pores lying on the ground or slightly dug into the ground. The water going into the horses is under high pressure to enable the emission of water into the soil throughout the entire length of the horse.

The water wells exist in varied sizes, such as the shallow, deep, and bore wells. While the shallow wells have minimum diameter and depth of two and three meters respectively, the deep wells have double the dimensions of shallow wells, and the bore wells have a minimum width and depth of 100 millimeters and 20 meters, respectively. All three types of water dams are fitted with single or three-phase electrical or diesel-type water pumps to push water to the ground level into the vertical sprinkler pipes (Al-Adili et al., 2017). The pumps usually vary in power from one to three HP. The wells can get linked to an underground or surface water source for the continuous supply of water during all seasons. Finally, several protection components to prevent flooding and falling of unwanted objects that might lead to blockage are incorporated.

Installation of Sprinklers

The installation of sprinkler systems on a farm, golf course, or landscape involves several steps that must get followed keenly. Firstly, the tools and materials need to be assembled according to the plan of the proposed system. The materials include Polyvinyl Chloride (PVC) valves, pipes, connectors, and sprinkler heads, among others.

In contrast, the tools required for the installation include pipe cutter, shovel, timer, vibratory plow, and many others (Reuter, 2017). Secondly, the location of the underground cables needs to be marked by the utility company. The marking comes after the demarcation of the boundaries of the property on which sprinklers are to acquire installation. Such landmarks need to be shown clearly in a drawing with plots of the location of sprinklers.

Thirdly, the visible markers should get placed at the relevant points, and the water source access line marked. In this installation, the water source is a well that is served with a water pump, as mentioned in the previous section. The anti-siphon valve will get installed before the water is led into the underground supply pipes to prevent the flow of saline water that might have got contaminated with chemicals from reaching the sprinkler. Fourthly, the trenches of between 6 to 8 inches deep will get dug to lay the pipes. The trenches should be made to slant at angles of about 45 degrees, and the sod and extracted soil placed on the opposite sides. The installation of manifold boxes, together with valves, and secured with clamps follow this step.

Next is the fitting of the three or four-inch PVC pipes to the open ends of the manifold valves. The pipes will get laid in the dug trenches with the help of tee and elbow connectors. Once the pipes reach the sprinkler points, the risers will be attached using the elbow connectors and adhesives. The splashing of water through the system to remove any debris that might be present will then get done, followed by the attaching of sprinkler heads. Once these steps are completed, the trenches will then be filled by the soil and sod. Finally, the control systems will be installed. Among the parameters to be controlled automatically, including the duration and regularity of watering depending on the irrigation needs. The testing of the system for proper functioning will then be done after the final connection of the water supply line and fine-tuning of the sprinkler heads to face appropriate directions.

Prices

Sprinkler system installation costs vary from time to time as well as from a location to another. For instance, it might be cheaper to install sprinkler systems in countries with an adequate skilled workforce for related operations than others without. Major contributors towards the variations include both the sprinkler system factors besides the natural physical conditions of the installation site (Reuter, 2017). Such include the contractor service costs, the sprinkler equipment types and material costs, the soil conditions, soil terrain, and size, among others.

It, therefore, costs between $ 6000 and $ 8000 to purchase and install sprinkler equipment on a one-acre property. Working with such price ranges, it will cost approximately between $ 60,000 and $ 80,000 to buy and entirely do the installation on the garden of interest. Of the already mentioned costs, about $ 80, 000, about $ 8, 000 goes towards the preliminary stages of the operation. Such operations include the contractor consulting fees, drawings of project plans, and securing necessary permits, and inspection clearances by the authorities. The remaining amount goes towards the purchase of consumable materials and the remaining operations.

Conclusion

In summary, the irrigation of farmlands, homestead grounds, golf courses, and landscapes undoubtedly adds fresh breath into them. For farms, the irrigation process protects humans from famine by supporting the cultivation of superior crops. Further, the irrigation water that increases the rate of dissolution of nutrients and plant fibers improves the condition of the soil remarkably. In the other sectors, irrigation improves the aesthetic views and promotes the growth of healthy vegetation that enhances the circulation of fresh air in the atmosphere. Even though the initial costs appear expensive, the advantages achieved by the application of the sprinkler system are numerous. They include enhanced water measurement techniques, less interference with the cultivation on the piece of land to be watered, and the attainment of remarkably higher operational efficiency, and affectivity among many others. As such, there should be deliberate efforts to enhance irrigation as one of the environmental conservation measures.

References

Al-Adili, A., Mohammed, M. R., & Alwash, H. H. (2017). Use of Shallow Groundwater in Sprinkler Irrigation (Case Study). Journal of Civil, Construction and Environmental Engineering, 2(2), 44. https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/73c0/d10e39bb6568e7a6ee7c24b3fd0a5c9d1155.pdf

Reuter, H. C. R. (2017). U.S. Patent Application No. 15/527,680. https://patentimages.storage.googleapis.com/8e/ea/24/432bf2371fe6be/US20170359975A1.pdf