Watering with Soil Moisture Sensors - Baseline Systems

©2011, Baseline Irrigation SolutionsA sprinkler zone with good distribution will look more like the illustration below where you are forced to“over irrigate” the entire zone to ensure that the dry areas receive an adequate supply of water.If you ignore the poor distribution in the zone, the soil moisture level in some areas will reach thepermanent wilting point, and you will lose plants in those areas as shown in the illustration below.If a zone has poor distribution, you have two choices for keeping the plants green: one, over irrigate thezone in order to provide enough water to the dry area, or two, diagnose and fix the problem.An Important Note on Intelligent Soak CyclesSoak cycling breaks the total run time set in the irrigation controller into shorter water “cycles” (timedwater applications) with “soak” periods in between to allow time for water to soak into the soil beforeapplying more water. Soak cycles save water by avoiding surface soil saturation and runoff.Even on a perfectly designed system, it is important to match the water application rate to theinfiltration rate of your soil. You configure this by breaking the total run time for any zone into multiplecycles and soaks.Remember that your number one goal is to use the least amount of water possible to keep the soilmoisture content in the root zone between field capacity and maximum allowed depletion (MAD). Whenyou combine the power of a Baseline soil moisture sensor with the Intelligent Soak Cycle functionality ofa Baseline irrigation controller, you’ll be amazed how easy it is to meet this goal. Based on the soilmoisture sensor readings, the system will automatically turn on the water before the moisture contentdrops below MAD, and shut off the water before it goes above field capacity. Soak cycling will minimizerunoff and move the moisture to the root zone of the plants.Watering with Soil Moisture Sensors12 | P age