SF Solar
New Member
Would like to know if that well production is considered low for 20 acre property with large home and pool and irrigation of pasture and orchard.
Is 5 gpm sufficient to support 20-acre ranch and home with irrigation for pastures?
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There are 1440 minutes in a day. You would be able to store and use up to 7200 gallons per day. That would run several houses. With care you could keep the pool topped off. With a drip system you could even do quite a bit of irrigation. It could even run two 2.5 GPM sprinkles 24 hours a day. If you start early and stay late you could keep those sprinklers moving and cover a few acres. But you need a lot more water for 20 acres of pasture and an orchard. Large trees can use 100-200 gallons per day each.
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The average person uses about 60 gallons per day (GPD) of water, but that number can vary by more than 50% depending on circumstances. I have metered systems for people who have very low production systems and seen them get that average down to under 40 GPD but to do it they are ever conscious of their low production system. As valveman stated, at 5 GPM yield well provides you with up to 7200 gallons of water a day, but only in ~5GPM max flow rates (once you deplete any reserve storage capacity of the well).
You can all but guarantee a reservoir storage system would satisfy the needs of the house and pool if the current system doesn't, but even a reservoir system may not be enough for your irrigation needs. If I were you I would spend some time learning about the water needs of your pasture and orchard to see if ~6500 GPD (7200 max GPD minus ~700 GPD needed for the house /pool/etc.) would be enough. If it is, then all you need to do is design a reservoir system with enough storage capacity to handle 7200 GPD. There are some additional convenience benefits of going to a reservoir system as well.
If you determine the well max production of 7200 GPD won't be enough for the property needs you could explore pond/lake options if the soil conditions are correct, and you can fill it with means other than the well, or you can look at drilling additional wells on the property to increase your max GPD capacity.
You can all but guarantee a reservoir storage system would satisfy the needs of the house and pool if the current system doesn't, but even a reservoir system may not be enough for your irrigation needs. If I were you I would spend some time learning about the water needs of your pasture and orchard to see if ~6500 GPD (7200 max GPD minus ~700 GPD needed for the house /pool/etc.) would be enough. If it is, then all you need to do is design a reservoir system with enough storage capacity to handle 7200 GPD. There are some additional convenience benefits of going to a reservoir system as well.
If you determine the well max production of 7200 GPD won't be enough for the property needs you could explore pond/lake options if the soil conditions are correct, and you can fill it with means other than the well, or you can look at drilling additional wells on the property to increase your max GPD capacity.
Boycedrilling
In the Trades
For sprinkler irrigation you need 6-10 gpm per acre, with drip irrigation you can get by with 2-3 gpm per acre. So best scenario you can irrigate 2-3 acres with your 5 gpm well.
Boycedrilling
In the Trades
Or looking at drip another way. In grapes we use drip tape with a 1/2 gallon per hour emitter every 24”. 5 gpm is 300 gallons per hour. That equals 1,200 feet of drip tape.
Or with trees, plan on 2 each 1/2 gph emitters per tree. So 1 gallon per hour per tree. 300 gallon per hour equals 300 trees
Or with trees, plan on 2 each 1/2 gph emitters per tree. So 1 gallon per hour per tree. 300 gallon per hour equals 300 trees
Pumper
New Member
No way. I'd go with at least 15 gpm, more like 22. I have a farm and irrigated Xmas trees with 2 miles of pipe/emitters. Pump was a Grundfos 22SQ-10-190 on a relay switch and Toro Controller.
Boycedrilling
In the Trades
Original poster indicates that he had a 5 gallon per minute yielding well. Doesn’t do any good to put a 15 or 20 gpm pump in a 5 gpm well.
I spent a number of years working for an irrigation dealer that sells center pivot irrigation systems. one of my duties was to design the sprinkler package for the pivot system.
Here in Eastern Washington, center pivots are used for right at 2,000 hours per year to irrigate a crop. Back when impact sprinklers were installed on top of the span pipe, the rule of thumb was 10 gpm per acre irrigated. A 1320 ft long pivot would irrigate about 135 acres of a 160 acre field. It would be nozzled for 1,350 gpm.
When we went to rotator type sprinklers on drop tubing, we saved about 15%of our water that we had been losing from evaporation and wind drift. Now we can put just as much water on the ground with 8.5 gpm per acre or 1150 gpm. Sometimes we can get by with 6.5 gpm/acre or 875 gpm total.
My neighbor raises spearmint and peppermint for the oil. Their pivots are set up with drag tubes. This is so the mint oil doesn't get washed off the mint plant before harvesting. However there are systems that use drip tubing as drag tubes in a center pivot. This almost completely eliminates evaporative losses and wind drift. There they can drop down to 3 to 4 gpm/acre.
We have 10’s of thousands of acres around us in tree fruit and grapes. They are almost exclusively on drip irrigation. The trees usually also have undertree or overhead sprinklers for frost control in the spring and evaporative cooling in the heat of the summer.
I spent a number of years working for an irrigation dealer that sells center pivot irrigation systems. one of my duties was to design the sprinkler package for the pivot system.
Here in Eastern Washington, center pivots are used for right at 2,000 hours per year to irrigate a crop. Back when impact sprinklers were installed on top of the span pipe, the rule of thumb was 10 gpm per acre irrigated. A 1320 ft long pivot would irrigate about 135 acres of a 160 acre field. It would be nozzled for 1,350 gpm.
When we went to rotator type sprinklers on drop tubing, we saved about 15%of our water that we had been losing from evaporation and wind drift. Now we can put just as much water on the ground with 8.5 gpm per acre or 1150 gpm. Sometimes we can get by with 6.5 gpm/acre or 875 gpm total.
My neighbor raises spearmint and peppermint for the oil. Their pivots are set up with drag tubes. This is so the mint oil doesn't get washed off the mint plant before harvesting. However there are systems that use drip tubing as drag tubes in a center pivot. This almost completely eliminates evaporative losses and wind drift. There they can drop down to 3 to 4 gpm/acre.
We have 10’s of thousands of acres around us in tree fruit and grapes. They are almost exclusively on drip irrigation. The trees usually also have undertree or overhead sprinklers for frost control in the spring and evaporative cooling in the heat of the summer.
Pumper
New Member
A SQE pump will help but obviously he needs to store and then draw from a high volume storage water tank.
Like you my emitters were low volume = 1/2 gpm on 6' centers.
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