Irrigation

Getting solution to each plant

A drip line is three pieces of kit: a thicker poly main, a manifold of tees and joiners that branches it, and an emitter on each pot. Pairing that emitter with the pot and the medium does most of the work. Under-feed and the edges of the medium dry first; over-feed and unused nutrient runs straight out the bottom.

Coco and clay pebbles empty quickly, so they want smaller, more frequent feeds. Soil and larger fabric pots hold water longer and want fewer, bigger ones. Both patterns have to be possible on the same bench, which is why adjustable drippers and feed rings sit together here.

Our range of irrigation

Feed rings and halos

Hydro Halo rings fit round pots from 20L to 90L. Dozens of outlet holes put solution around the stem, and three legs raise or lower the ring so the wet footprint widens or tightens. Free Flow Feed Rings cover the same job in three sizes — Mini for 20L pots, Small for 30L and Large at 400mm across for 50L and above — with oversized 6mm elbows made so salt is less likely to block them.

Drippers and flow control

The adjustable 360° dripper takes 4mm barbed line and can run anywhere from 0 to 33 litres per hour, throwing a full circle around the plant. Further up the run, the Variflow inline threaded valve does the same balancing job: even the flow between zones, or slow one plant, without swapping emitters.

Hose, fittings and manifolds

Black soft poly hose is here in 4mm and 6mm on 100m rolls for spaghetti line, and in 13mm, 19mm and 25mm on 30m rolls for mains and manifolds. Tight corners are what the supersoft non-kink 19mm polytube is for. Dripco make the joinery — joiners, reducing joiners, tees, reducing tees, elbows, end plugs, top hat grommets and inline taps in 13mm, 19mm and 25mm — plus barbed crosses for four-way splits and a Sensen non-return valve.

Timers and automation

The PLANT!T Water Timer will run from a tap or from gravity off a tank. Run times sit between 1 and 120 minutes, intervals from hourly to weekly, and an inline filter comes with the fittings. The Drip Pro 3 micro pump will feed up to eight small plants at 480ml per minute and is scheduled from an app. The Blumat gravity system uses no power at all: each ceramic cone reads soil moisture and only lets through what the plant is taking.

How to choose emitters and line

1. Size the emitter to the pot. Round pots from 20L up are where a feed ring earns its place. Use one dripper on small pots, in propagation, or anywhere you want to set each plant on its own.
2. Match the flow to the medium. Coco and pebbles that empty quickly want short, frequent hits; soil wants fewer, larger ones. Dial an adjustable dripper rather than rebuilding the line.
3. Work out your line sizes before buying fittings. Spaghetti in 4mm or 6mm feeds each plant; 13mm to 25mm is the room-scale main. A joiner, tee or end plug only works if it matches the hose it sits on.
4. Filter what you are pumping. Emitters block on salt and debris. That is why Free Flow run oversized bores, and why the PLANT!T timer includes an inline filter.
5. Decide how it triggers. Start with a timer if you just want a clock. Use an app-scheduled pump when you care about volume. Use Blumat when the medium itself should call the shots.

Gravity feeding without power

Height stands in for a pump. Blumat want the spigot about 5cm above the tank floor and the reservoir at least 70cm above the watering level so there is enough pressure, and a lightproof tank that gets cleaned from time to time so the cones stay clear. Their own numbers are one dripper per pot up to 20cm across, two up to 40cm, and three up to 50cm.

If you want a ready-made feed system instead of assembling parts, see self feeding systems. Holding tanks sit on the tanks and reservoirs page, and the pump that fills the main is on the water pumps page.