Irrigation 2013

It's September and I've gotten lazy again. Since we are almost finished with irrigation I ought to tell you we have been doing this summer.


Farming in the middle of Nebraska we need to irrigate if we hope to raise a normal crop every year. The picture at left shows the difference between irrigated and dryland.

We have two different water sources, surface and ground. Surface water is diverted out of a river or stream and then transported to the fields by canals or pipe. Our water comes from the Platte River and is brought to our farm by the Dawson County Canal. It is the third oldest canal in Nebraska and was dug with horses and mules about 1894.

 At right you are looking down the canal north of our house. It is already half the size it was at the river 12 miles upstream. The Platte River falls 6 feet every mile it moves east. The canals were designed to fall 1 foot every mile. This way the canal moves away from the river as it moves east.

Ground water is water taken from the ground (simple huh?). Our ground water comes from the Ogallala Aquifer, one of the largest fresh water aquifers in the world. We are very fortunate to have a very thick water supply that is also close to the surface. We hit water about 10 feet down and the water bearing sand and gravel is about 200 feet thick. This a picture of our newest well, drilled 3 years ago. We do have limitations on drilling new wells, they can only replace old wells.

 We use three different ways to deliver the water to the plants in the field now. My father used two others in previous decades, but newer methods are more efficient. The "oldest" method we currently use is gated pipe. This is either aluminum or plastic pipe that is 8-10" in diameter. There are rectangular holes cut in one side and plastic gates inserted to plug the holes.


Every summer around July 1 we have to string out the pipe on the ends of the fields. I usually recruit some high school kids to help. The pipes are 30' feet long and we put out about 5 miles of pipe so that is a lot of pipe.

This a picture of the water coming out of the open gates. When we are irrigating we have to go to each field and open a new set of rows and close the old rows twice a day. We use old golf putters to tap the gates open and closed. Saves a lot of sore backs.

We use gated pipe on both surface and ground water. Most fields we have a pump on the surface water to pressurize it for the gated pipe. Some fields have enough gravity drop to work without a pump.

Each fall we must remember to flush the gated pipe that is on surface water. There is sediment in the water that settles out in the pipe. The picture at right is just after I pulled the plug. It will flush for several hours before the water starts running clear. If we don't the pipes will have enough mud in them to make it almost impossible to pick up in the fall.


After the last irrigation (and flush) we pull the pipes apart and then find another crew of strong backs to pick all the pipe back up and pile it for next year.

We started using gated pipe in 1975 and until a few years ago that was all we used. Then I purchased a couple of center pivot irrigation systems (left). The look like a pipe in the air with wheels underneath. One end is fastened to a pivot point and the other end moves around the field in a circle. They have sprinklers on them similar to ones in your yard, put more precise.

A new center pivot system is about $75,000 to $100,000 depending on what you add to the package. Normally they need little daily attention, other than to make sure they are still running. We have ours set up to send a text message to our phone if something happens to it. We also have an app to control the pivot from wherever we are. They are more efficient in using water than the gated pipe and take much less labor. Much of the land previously irrigated with gated pipe is being converted to pivots in our area if they fit the field. One downside is that pivots irrigate a circle in a square field so there are corners that will be dryland or will have to be irrigated another way.

The newest irrigation technology is subsurface drip irrigation (SDI). It has been used in orchards and other high value crops for several years, but is now finding a foothold in rowcrops here. I installed this system 3 years ago and am very happy. It is about twice as expensive as a full center pivot on a per acre basis, but if your field is small, rectangular or irregular shaped, it may be about the same price per acre.

This picture shows the valves that control which sections of the field get water. I am currently adding a computer controller to my system so that it can be controlled remotely.

Normally we finish irrigating by Labor Day, but not this year. We will be irrigating until September 14 at least. The crops got behind with some cool weather in August and are not mature yet. If we stop irrigating too soon the plants die early and the yield drops off dramatically.

Irrigation Wrap Up

I haven't posted for awhile, alright a loooong while. It is hard to believe that fall is approaching and schools are starting.

This has been the summer of the drought. All growing season has been early, planting in mid April, etc. Irrigation was not different. We started running the pivots on June 14 and started the gravity soon after. I have never laid out pipe before June 20 and ths year we were across most of the corn the first time by June 20.

We will be starting our 6th rotation on the gravity irrigation on corn on Monday, yikes. Hopefully this will be the last time for the corn crop. The soybeans will take two more shots. Normally we run at most 4 rotations, usually we can get by with 3 rotations with a few rain events helping out. Not this year.

We received a total of 1.5" of rain at our home place in June & July combined. August has been a little more kind, but still has given only about 1" so far. Through all this we have not had one day off irrigating somewhere since June 14.

The rain in July did not come without its terrible relative, hail. The corn around our house had about 60% defoliation of the upper leaves. Luckily the lower leaves are still intact and will feed some to the developing corn ears The crop insurance adjuster is estimating a maximum loss of 25% on much of our corn. He hopes it will be less but estimates on the high side.

We do carry insurance on all of our crops, since that is all the income we have. We carry both multi-peril insurance that is subsidized by USDA and production hail insurance.

For those who care, multi-peril is for catastrophic losses. They pay up to 75% of your average historic yield. We hope to never file a claim on that, but did last year on one field. The hail insurance is just for hail losses. It covers from the expected yield down to the 75% level that the multi-peril covers. Crop insurance is very complicated and even I can't keep all the details straight.

We have ben out pulling a few ears, estimating what our yields will be when the combine starts through. What we are seeing is very encouraging. Ear sizes are good to great. Now if the kernels will continue to fill out and get long. The cool nights we are having right now are great. That is what the corn needs to finish off the crop.

Soybean pod counts are also looking good. They are still  blooming and setting more pods. More water and sun is needed but should be fine.

We are expecting an early harvest, why should things change? We will start on high moisture corn for a neighboring feedlot around Labor Day. That is 2-4 weeks early. Soybeans are about 2 weeks early as well, which is a huge surprise.

Soybeans are a light sensitive crop, they use the day length to start blooming and setting pods. The large amount of sunlight we have had this summer (no rain=no clouds) has sped them up.

In a couple of weeks we will be picking up our irrigation pipe. If any of you want to tone up your upper body, come on out and we'll give you a free workout. :-)