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Eugene, OR

Anyone tried this and had good results? I've been thinking about setting up some sort of underground system but being a new grower I have no idea how much water to deliver directly to the roots without overdoing it and causing root rot.

I was thinking of using a drip line or a soaker hose looped underground in S curves at the stump and under the entire area where I expect the main vine to grow. I was also thinking about using some sort of gadget that would mix various fertilizers in with the water thats being delivered directly to the roots but I'm not sure if delivering fertilizer directly to the root system would harm the plant.

Any ideas/suggestions?

Happy Holidays!

Brian

12/8/2003 6:40:17 PM

Kuna, Id.

Do a search at this site for it was a lot of talk about it this last summer

12/8/2003 6:51:17 PM

In the shade - PDX, OR

Soakers will clog after soluable fert is run through it.
Look @ Doc's diary from this year - there is some good theory there.

I believe that he was going to run some T-tape under his patch but ran out of time.

Hey Doc still plannin' on digging in the T-tape?

12/8/2003 8:17:20 PM

Ontario, Canada.

Brian - Take at look at Mudflaps diary and photos. He has neat idea. 3" drain pipe with 1/8" holes drilled. Its not automatic but it is cost effective.
Russ L.

12/8/2003 8:23:45 PM

Ontario

I use 150 feet of sprinkler hoses under each of plants. I used soaker hoses before but they do clog up. The sprinkler hoses work just fine. The only draw back is accidentially cutting into the hoses with a shovel while weeding. As for how much water to use, that entirely depends on your type of soil (clay or sandy) weather conditions and weight gain by your pumpkin. I've found this system by far the easiest to use and the benefits far out-weigh the draw backs. BTW if you use sprinkler hoses, you don't need to build a water tower. The water dribbles out of the barrels just fine at ground level. I've had no problem with fertilizers either. You can either use small amounts daily in your water barrels or use a 5 gallon bucket with water soluble fetilizer in that. I found this method elimates the need for foliar spraying in that you fertilize the secondary rooting system through your hoses.

12/8/2003 11:56:12 PM

Eugene, OR

Thanks for the info guys. I checked out that T-Tape stuff. Looks like a good product and you can't beat the low pressure/high flow design. Thank you docGipe for the link to Dripworks. They should give you a price break for being such a good advertiser of their products!

I'm still a little iffy on the fertilizer part of it. What sort of fertilizers do you use and when do you use them? I realize there's no set formula for growing big but I'm just trying to find out what the majority of growers feel is a requirement. Nitrogen early in the year? Late in the year? Potassium during flower development? I have no clue on this aspect!

Once again, thank you all for your help. This site rocks!

Brian

12/9/2003 1:46:00 AM

Menomonie, WI ([email protected])

Brian if you dont have them yet. Get your hands on Don Langevins "How To Grow World Class Giant Pumpkins". He has three volumes out. I feel #2 gives the best info for the new grower. Volume # 3 is very indepth, but an excellent resource. Shannon

12/9/2003 4:06:27 AM

Appalachian Mtns.

I used T-tape this year, very happy with it.

12/9/2003 6:21:50 AM

Wood River, Nebraska

Brian, T-Tape works great!! I made a shoe to fit my Troybuilt and plowed it in about 4" deep. Chemilizer has a very good fertilizer injector. I have a very old one I've been using for the last 10 years. I'm getting myself a new HN55 for Christmas.
Happy Holidays
http://www.hogslat.biz/61050.html
http://www.usgr.com/fertilization-feeding/chemilizer.html

12/9/2003 10:48:04 AM

Eugene, OR

Wow, nice units...but man are they spendy! Not enough money in the budget for a piece of equipment like that. :-(

I plan on ordering Don's 3 book set in a couple of weeks which will be cool. Those of you who used the T-tape, any problems with clogging when using soluable ferts?

12/9/2003 5:08:06 PM

Montoursville, PA

T-Tape from Dripworks in Calif is reasonably priced. I had heavy rain all year. Ending result is I hoed it in about five inches deep. It worked just fine. See it in my diary and E me if you like. The folks at Dripworks are fine helpers.
....My system was gravety fed and I did use ferts but I knew the quality grind of my ferts were OK. That question is relative to the quality grind of the ferts. Joel Hollands Kelp flew right through with no problem . All of the AGRO-K ferts worked through just fine. One could of course perhaps find ferts that may not work through.

12/10/2003 7:44:25 PM

[email protected]

Ahhhh. Dwaine just pointed out an important fact. Not all the souble fertilizers are the same. And yet they all change from year to year. Why? The milling equipment that is used to grind the raw materials is subject to significant wear. And none of the processors upgrade equipment every year. So before we blame poorly designed irrigation eqipment (and that happens too), it is important to look also at what we're trying to run through the emitters. The most popular brand of consumer soluble fertilizers produced a terrible product this past year. Good for me. I sold a lot more of our Macron as a result. LOL

True liquid solutions cost more money. But they NEVER clog well designed systems. And slow release Nitrogen is available in true solutions now too. Not true of the milled solubles.

Steve

12/10/2003 8:51:22 PM

Eugene, OR

Hmmm, interesting things to think about. After more thinking, I was kind of leaning towards adding the soluable fertilizers directly to the water supply(6 40 gallon barrels) and using a filter to remove any large particles from the water before it enters the T-tape to prevent possible clogs. What do ya think?

12/10/2003 9:10:53 PM

[email protected]

Whatever accumulates in the filter didn't arrive in the patch. So the finished analysis is thus different tah intended. Use high quality solubles & you won't have this problem. But use the strainer anyway to avoid other bits of junk from getting in the lines.

12/10/2003 10:01:23 PM

Eugene, OR

Perhaps I'm misunderstanding the term "soluable." I've never worked with soluable fertilizers so I have no idea how much they actually dissolve in water. In my mind, I thought soulable meant that the fertilizer will completely dissolve in the water...the way sugar dissolves in water which is why I thought a filter would be the way to go to take care of any particles that didn't dissolve.

Your response leaves me wondering.....how much do "soluable" fertilizers actually dissolve?

Brian

12/10/2003 10:13:48 PM

[email protected]

Brian,

It depends on the mill. The finer the raw materials are milled the quicker & more completely they disolve.

We operate the largest liquid fertilizer plant in New England. And it's the only large scale production facility that utilizes heat. So some of our clients won't even consider our competitors offers to produce specific blends because the solubility of certain ingredients varies. Phosphorous is an example of a hard to disolve material without heat. Regional raw material fluctation issues limit choices too.

We're primarily concerned here with cold water solubility of dry purchased materials so milling is critical. Milled too fine & the material cakes when exposed to humidity. Milled too coarse & the stuff doesnt disolve. Sort of a Catch-22 thing.

The only way around the disolve-ability issue when fertigating is to use true liquid solutions. And that's why John Deere & Toro Irrigation divisions wisely thought to ally themselves with or procure fertilizer manufacturers to capitalize on the fertigation trends. They know darn well they can't seell high quality fertigation systems then let the clients run out & buy whatever old soluble fertilizer is on sale at the ag co-op. Because the reputation of the system is very suspect when it's all clogged with undisolved fertilizer & malfunctioning every time it's used.

There are other issues too. As a for instance, Iron causes potash to fall out of solution in liquid concentrates. So instructions for high quality utilization of fertilizer solutions would require me writing a bloody text book here. So throw specific questions for those who have the need.

Steve

12/11/2003 11:40:27 AM

mcminnville oregon

brian if i remember you also have a sloping garden? I bury 3" perf pipe using tee's to connect water stations! 55gal barrels w/valves work great for myself? Ive burned plannts w/fertilizers , but had great success with seeweed or kelp extracts??? the warming of water annd regulated flow works great! I was watering 110gal daily without saturation obove ground! have you joined the PGVG yet?

12/11/2003 12:24:29 PM

Eugene, OR

Steve, thanks for that informative reply. I understand what you're saying about the milling process. Having worked on a couple of projects involving quality control, I know all too well how much quality in design and maintenance can effect the quality of the product being produced. Quality management is interesting but it's not my cup-o-tea!!

You make a good point that a fine powder will cake up and a coarse powder won't dissolve properly. Like most of us are....I'm on a budget so a product that works well but won't break the bank is what I'm in search of. Any suggestions?

Dave, You remember correctly! Regarding your system, do you get ample flow at the end of the line? Seems like using that large of a perforated pipe would effect the amount of water reaching the end of the line. How big are the perforations?

And yes, I sent in my membership check to PGVG a few weeks ago but haven't received any info yet. Do you guys normally send out some sort of membership info to new members? I can't wait to get up to Canby next year and meet you guys. I may not have a huge pumpkin to weigh, but I'll be there!

Happy Holidays all!

Brian

12/11/2003 5:02:07 PM

Buffalo, NY

Brian, I do pretty much what you said; I run 1/2" drip line (.600"ID x .700"OD) that has non-clogging built-in emitters every foot. I have it snaked North & South with hairpin curves on each end, about 3 or 4 lengths in about 250-300 sq ft.

Over all this, I dumped about 12-16" of municipal compost, which had a mild fertilizer rating of about 1.1N, 0.33P, 0.66K. The plants got transplanted in/over the 180 degree hairpin curves.

To this, an EZ-FLO fertilizer injector system supplied Plantex water soluble fertilizer plus essentials (and occasionally Neptunes Harvest or Maxicrop), daily whenever the water came on (about 30 minutes per day if it didn't rain.) This year, I removed my E-Z Gro 3/4 gallon injector and installed a larger 3 gallon model EZ-Flo system, around $60. The 3/4g model was about $45 a couple yrs ago. I may have the spelling wrong on the names but the first was EZ GRO and the 2nd was EZ FLO, regardless of where the hyphen belongs, as I believe they are the same company but changed the name maybe. There's a knob on the cap to adjust the fertilizer injection rate, I think this model is adjustable from 100 to 1000 gallons of water per 1 gallon of fertilizer. The actual system also fertilizes 60+ tomatoes, 34 peppers, and basically everything else in my yard at the same time thru a control valve & filter assembly.

For what it's worth, I grew over 800 lbs of AG's in under 300 sq ft, but they were much too crowded, being 3 plants & 4 fruits in that space. Next year will try just 1 or 2 plants if I get any decent seeds. Some of that square footage includes part of my blacktop driveway.

Hope this helps. Some pics at the URL below.

Mark

http://mysite.verizon.net/korney19/__2003Pumpkins.jpg

12/13/2003 10:19:03 PM