Hammocked Banana

Wow I hope after watching all your work I can install a fertigation system like that!

crazy banana

R I C H A R D: we are update deprived. How are all your plants doing in this plant heaven environment?

Richard

A few months ago I cut my phone bill from $110/mo. to $45/mo. by switching out my 2 year old iPhone 5 for an AT&T (LG) Z998 smartphone and restricting data to WiFi only. I'm happy about the cost savings but the camera and camera firmware has a strange color balance. Typically it over-saturates in blue and/or purple. As a consequence, I've been taking fewer pictures.

Here's a view of my two banana plats, taken yesterday. In the foreground you see Namwa followed by Temple. Further down on the left before the red cement mixer are Brazilian and Pisang Ceylon. They're all about 5' at the pstem crotch.

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Richard

Today I worked off-and-on again digging a 50 foot long trench to carry a conduit pipe for irrigation control wire. Whew! Glad that's over with.

On the right of the picture, you can also see just past the ladder an artichoke plant in a 25-gallon pot. Just past those are some blueberry and huckleberry plants. Once the conduit is in, I'll build dual planter beds for those plants.

On the left of the picture you'll notice a lot of masonry block. These are awaiting installation to form 4 planter beds for tubers, fruiting vegetables, herbs, and leafy vegetables. The weather is cooling down again so who knows, maybe I'll finish before Thanksgiving!

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Richard

Today I completed what I call "grand central station" !!

The short story: some control wires for irrigation come from inside the house under the backyard patio and are directed to various places in the yard.

The long story for the few I know are interested:
* You see three 1.5" 'toe boxes'.
* On the left side, from the house and under the back patio comes a 1.5" conduit carrying multiple cables.
* In the first box on the left, lots of bundles come in and one 10 x 18 gauge bundle goes out to the back planter beds. The remaining bundles carry through.
* In the second (middle) box, a 5 x 18 gauge bundle exits for automatic valves on the back patio, and an 10 x 18 g. bundle exits to the fertigation bus subsystem.
* In the third (right) box, a 3-wire romex exits in a 3/4" line to service a water feature controlled by an interior switch/timer, and three 5 x 18 gauge wires continue through out the 1.5" exit to service the orchard.

The pipes will be buried when I fill the trenches, and the toe boxes will be obscured from vision by a rectangular irrigation box.

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boffcheck

wow I like that kind of automation!!

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lmswayne

You are the man! I want to say that your fertilizer is great my trees are so happy my pair tree bloomed again and I have a second crop coming on and my kiwis have doubled in size it is amazing. Thank you.

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Richard

4 months, 3 tools, 2 quarts of phosphoric acid --> one six foot pipe trench through a decaying palm tree stump.

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merce3

would this setup be feasible to put together for the hobbyist (me)? any basic plans that you can share? i want to step my game up in the spring.

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Hammocked Banana

What did u use the acid for Richard? Digesting the stump??

Richard

Yes, after not getting more than a few feet dug the first month, I poured a quart of 30% phosphoric acid where I wanted to place the trench, and then waited a month. That helped a bit, but not enough so I poured another quart on and waited a month. Then I waited for last month's heatwave to subside and dug it out today.

Yes, yes, and go for it!!

I will write you one and endeavor to post it in the Guides section of my website by the end of Fall. Please nag me by email. At the moment I'm also writing another guide called "About Fertilizer" which hopefully will help people with the basic differences between nutrients, hormones (growth regulators), soil conditioners, and surfactants/adjuvants. Unfortunately, all four of those are typically classified as plant fertilizers.

I don't own either of those devices, nor do I have a lawn or weeds to whack down. Annual rainfall here for 9/2013 through 8/2014 was 4.6 inches. Any weeds that come up are pulled, and since they are usually from blossoms in my herb garden they get eaten too!

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jbyrd88888

Touché Richard... Point well made (had a good notion, I was leaving some variables out.)

I can only see a new fresh separate (clevery located) circuit panel well worth the investment; at the stage you're at. Sure you could just drop extention cords but
thinkin'bout it: gazebo and tool shed; you will end up getting something later/afterwhile?


How can you live without a lawnmower and weedeater? Can life really exist or are you supernatural?

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■□■ J-Bert's Nana Grow Log ○●○
●○● UPDATED 6-21-2015 ■□■

trebor

Ha ha ... That's some funny stuff rite there!

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If ya can't eat it, it ain't growing in my back yard !

Richard

Yeah Trevor, he totally missed the consequence of 4.6 inches is rainfall per year.

It's not just one circuit panel but 4 controller panels with 9 valves each + master valve triggers etc. heading down the pipe to grand central station.

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Richard

Here's a photo of the irrigation controllers. They're indoors on a wall in my sunroom. The control wires travel down and into the large 1.5" conduit that travels under my patio. I'll be adding one more controller box before its all finished.

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Richard

Here's the tee off location for a 165 ft miniature golf course that I staked out through the orchard today. I'm not sure how many holes there will be, probably six to ten. Hopefully, knowing where the course is now I can go ahead and install irrigation, lighting, and power in the orchard without having to retrofit later when I build the golf paths.

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trebor

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If ya can't eat it, it ain't growing in my back yard !

Richard

I've been installing electrical conduit for outdoor garden lighting off-and-on since springtime. Well today I finished that task, about 450 feet of conduit and trench. The circuit is switched from inside the house. It exits the house on the south side and then circles around to the east, north, and then west. There are also some side jaunts for lighting along a few pathways.

Shown below is the junction where a run along the north meets the western run I completed last month. There are about 2 dozen such junctions in the yard. After I pull 3-wire 14-gauge Romex (AC wiring) from junction to junction, I'll mount a junction box on top to join the pipes, and mount an outdoor lighting fixture on top of the junction box. I'm planning on using 9-Watt CFL daylight bulbs.

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GreenFin

That is outrageously cool.

Your awesomeness knows no bounds!

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Richard

Today I installed the 1st row of irrigation risers for the fruit orchard.

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