Friendship Park Conservatory

June 2010 - Solar Rain Pump - Automatic System

We installed a system for Friendship Park Conservatory last year for their Dahlia garden and this year we updated the system with some improvements. Here is the breakdown of the entire project:

Challenges:

• Dahlia garden is a prized exhibit at Friendship Park and it is difficult to water with a watering truck
• Dahlia bed is 150 feet away from the rain collection tank
• Dahlia flowers need a significant amount of water but at the roots because the leaves can get dieseased if wet too long

The whole irrigation process starts at the rain water collection tank. Friendship Park provided a 1000 gallon tank that used to be outfitted on one of their trucks and they placed it next to their greenhouse for rain water collection.

The Solar Rain Pump - Automatic unit pumps the water from the 1000 gallon tank and to the Dahlia garden. There is a 150 foot length of irrigation tubing underground that runs from the tank to the garden. The Solar Rain Pump - Automatic unit automatically irrigates the flower bed without intervention from the staff, allowing them to concentrate their efforts elsewhere.

After the water is pumped from the tank by the Solar Rain Pump the zone controller is programmed to divert the water to the necessary zone for irrigation. The first zone waters the Dahlias and the second zone waters the plants around the border of the flower bed. The clocks are synced between the Solar Rain Pump - Automatic and the zone controller so the whole system is automated. The Solar Rain Pump is recharged with a 15-Watt solar panel.

In the picture to the left you can see the irrigation lines running through the Dahlia bed. At this time of the season the border plants have not been planted yet so the second irrigation line is absent. The irrigation system for the Dahlia's consists of 1/2 inch mainline tubing that snakes through the Dahlia bed with 1/4 inch lines running to the individual plants. The individual plants have 2 - 2 gallon per hour drippers that irrigate the plants.

The picture the the right is a close up picture of the double 2 gallon per hour drippers at the base of each Dahlia flower. When the system runs for a half hour 2 gallons of water is placed at the base of each plant.

This installation was just finished in early June of 2010 so the Dahlias planted this year are not flowering yet but the picture on the left are the Dahlias from last season.