An Interview with Tom Bressan, Founder of the Urban Farmer Store
by Margie Siegal
Setting up a drip irrigation system for your vegetable garden is an excellent DIY project. It takes a minimum of tools, information is available, the components are not very expensive and there is even an item known as a “goof plug” which will quickly fix most mistakes.
An irrigation system will make the most of the limited water in this ecosystem, but it also has other charms:
- Many vegetables (such as tomatoes) are susceptible to disease if their leaves get wet. A drip irrigation system directs all water to the roots.
- Keeping the soil moisture level constant can improve yields and plant survival.
- A timer can be built into the system. Your veggies get watered automatically, leaving more time to either enjoy your yard or weed, depending.
Alameda Backyard Growers interviewed Tom Bressan, founder of the Urban Farmer Store, for more information on setting up a drip system. The Urban Farmer Store specializes in residential and smaller commercial irrigation systems (as well as rainwater and greywater systems), and stocks all the components to put one together yourself. The Urban Farmer Store now has several locations, and the local branch is off Highway 80, in Richmond.
Tom points out that the Urban Farmer website has a comprehensive set of on-line guidebooks, which should answer many of your questions.
The first step in putting an irrigation system together is to draw a diagram of your garden area, making sure to note where the outside faucet is. Unless you are designing a greywater system (which is outside the scope of this article) the faucet (known in irrigation parlance as a Hose Bibb for unknown reasons) is the start point of your irrigation system.
You will need to design a layout for your drip system BEFORE you go out and order a load of supplies, otherwise you will be spending your entire weekend running back and forth to the store. Get some graph paper (grids can be downloaded from the Internet and printed) draw your garden to scale and draw in your projected irrigation system. The Urban Farmer drip irrigation manual (on the website) has sample layouts and suggestions for systems for hanging plants, borders, raised beds and garden rows.
The first item that goes on the faucet is a Y valve, which allows you to have a watering hose for washing off turnips and filling kiddie pools without dismantling your irrigation system. From bitter experience, the one item you do NOT want to save money on is the Y valve. A cheap Y valve will self-destruct at the worst possible time, and refuse to come off the faucet so it can be replaced. Depending on your faucet (excuse me, Hose Bibb) you may need an adjustable wrench and some plumber’s tape (both items available at Pagano’s Hardware) to get a water tight installation.
Once you have the Y valve installed and non-leaking, you can start building your irrigation system. The first item that goes on the irrigation arm of the Y valve is a timer. Timers range from manual items that you have to turn on by hand to expensive state of the art programmable instruments that will talk to your smartphone. Some timers have four different dials corresponding to four different outlets so you can water some parts of your garden more than others. The next item is a hose that will reach to your vegetable garden or raised beds. A commercial installation would use a pipe instead of a hose, but installing rigid pipe is a little beyond most of us. Tom agrees that a hose will work just fine in a home irrigation system.
After the hose is an optional filter (a good idea if you have old pipes or a rainwater system) and then a pressure regulator. The last item before the poly tubing that carries water to your plants is hose thread to tubing adapter. All these items are inexpensive and will last a long time. If someone in the house complains about the cost, have them meditate on the water bill for a while.
Tom says that ¼” irrigation tubing will work well for most backyard vegetable gardens. One type of this tubing comes with the emitters (the little button like things that drip water on the roots of your plants) already installed, all you have to do is stake the tubing where you want it. Plastic stakes are available to keep the tubing under control. In my experience, you need one stake every 18 inches, and extras where the tubing makes a bend. Tubing can be cut with your pruners or heavy duty scissors. If you are installing emitters, you need a punch to poke holes in the tubing.
Once you get your system set up, set the timer and keep an eye on your plants for at least a week. Are all of your veggies getting water? If not, you need to install more emitters. If you put an emitter in the wrong place and are watering a rock, that is what your goof plugs are for. If your plants look unhappy, up the amount of time set on the timer. If the ground is soggy, cut back.
People have successfully set up irrigation systems for at least eight thousand years, despite the fact that they had no plastic (or even iron in the early years) no Internet and most couldn’t read or write. The civilizations of Egypt and Babylonia were based on crops grown with intricate irrigation systems. If they could do it, so can you. The Urban Farmer, 2121 San Joaquin Street, Richmond, CA 94804 Phone: (510) 524-1604 is here to assist.
