How to adjust when neighbor is watering one of my zones?

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1

One of my zones receive water from my neighbor’s sprinkles (the side of my driveway). How you recommend me to include that?

I’m currently using flexible daily schedules.

Thanks!

2

What is it watering on your side? Grass?

3

Yes, grass

4

Does his sprinklers cover your entire grass zone or just part of it

5

I think entire. It’s a narrow zone on the side of the driveway. When my neighbor waters his main lawn my driveway ends wet.

6

Ok, if your entire zone is getting watered, does your neighbor water enough to keep your grass zone looking healthy? Maybe you can get the ultimate water savings by using his water for that zone

7

That’s my thought too. But to be in the safe side I would like to do some watering in case the zone isn’t receiving enough water.

What is the better way to do that? Should I put fake shade, modify depletion, efficiency, duration…?

Any thoughts?

8

You could do 1 of a few things

  1. Perform a catch cup test on the water that is being put out by both your sprinklers and your neighbors, then with that information, create a custom nozzle that accounts for the output of both sprinklers. So if you measure your neighbor putting out 1.0 in/hr and your sprinklers put out 1.5 in/hr, then create a custom nozzle of 2.5 in/hr and Rachio will assume your grass gets watered that much.

  2. Change your crop coefficient to a lower number. Warm season grass default is 0.65. If you drop that lower to say 0.4 (for example), you’ll notice that your frequency of watering will decrease…meaning the number of days between watering increases

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9

Thanks!

I got the first one, great idea!

The second one no, why I would like higher frequency?

10

@felipehb I updated my post. If you lower crop coeffecient, you’ll decrease frequency, meaning more days in between watering… my thought is because if it’s getting water from nearby, you do not have to water as often

11

Nothing will be perfect in this situation without control of the neighbors sprinklers nor knowledge of the soil moisture level. If things look good without watering for a few weeks, I would leave it off, but keep an eye on it over time, especially if your neighbor goes on vacation. If your neighbor is on a fixed schedule and time but things don’t look good enough, I would use the correct nozzle rate (not a combination) and lower the crop coefficient down to about 1/2 (40), making 5% adjustments up and down from there over long periods of time until it is spot on (until your neighbor changes things on his end).
Another low cost good option for one small area is manual only based on perceived stress level.

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