More soil type stuff, Loam or Sandy Loam. Rocks with soil, Water time

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I’m in Parker, CO, pinery area. This area historically has Sandy Loam type soil. I think the people who had this house built, put in some topsoil on top of that. Should I put in Sandy Loam or just Loam?

Also, I have some areas with shrubs/tree that have River Rock on top of the soil. Should I use the same as above or something different?

Also, I set up the SqFt of the River Rock area in Advanced settings. It seems when I use flexible schedule, it is using too much time in this area.

Example: 800sqft with River Rock. Tree/Shrubs. I set for Shrubs/Sandy Loam, flat, lots of sun. fixed spray head. Usually I set up this area for less than my grass area, but Rachio almost 4x the mins. example…my grassy areas are 17mins. Rachio uses 41 minutes in these Rock/shrub/tree areas.

Maybe since the sprinklers are actually setup in these areas to point right towards the tree/shrubs, I shouldn’t be using the 800sqft area?

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Got an answer for the water time for the shrubs/rocks and soil type. Rachio support says to use the soik underneath the rocks.

Also the run time should be high for these areas, but less often.

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@mogulman Support is right on the money! You should be using the soil type that will actually be holding the water. Sounds like Sandy Loam is your best option. As for the long watering times, they are correct again, flex is a different way of watering. Duration will be quite a bit longer, but will be a lot less often.

Just an FYI, zone size only affects our estimated usage. You should enter the area that the water is being applied over.

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So if something is 800sqft for the zone maybe only 1/2 or 1/3 is being watered, I would put maybe 300?

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Yep! Again, this is only used for the estimates we give for usage, so this won’t ultimately affect your waterings. But it sounds like scaling those down would help make the estimate more accurate.

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Ok. Can you turn off the snow so I can try my Rachio?:sunglasses:

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I feel you- we are based in Denver, and I can’t tell you how close I was to starting my system up two weeks ago :joy: What a waste that would’ve been.

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