New to Rachio, coming from a Blossom controller. I have a quick question, please:
New England location
Cool Season grass, Loam soil type, sunny exposure
Set all zones as “Flex Daily”, Any Day schedule
50% Depletion, 70% Efficiency, 78% Crop Coeff
We had a pretty good rain event (1.2 in) ~ a week ago - before I installed Rachio - and light drizzle (0.1 in) one night, mainly partly cloudy & cool since (60’s). Rachio has run a single zone in this first week, for 6 total minutes.
Today I see several of my Zones are now below 50% Moisture (35%, 45%, etc.). Should I expect Rachio to water these zones in the next day or so? Schedule indicates next run in like 4-5 days. Zero watering in past week and then next 4-5 days, except for that 6 minute run. Is this typical?
Am I looking at this correctly - when Moisture dips below the depletion level (50%), and forecast does not predict rain, Rachio should water, right?
Thanks for any guidance
If the schedule indicates the next run is in 4 to 5 days it probably won’t water in the next day or so. I live in Rhode Island and my sprinklers were just turned on May 4. The sprinklers have run once since then and are scheduled to run again tomorrow.
Can you post screenshots of the soil moisture table for a couple of your zones, especially the ones below 50%. The table looks like this
There are a number of other variables that will affect the frequency of watering in addition to the ones you list - such as zone type, root depth, nozzle inches per hour, etc. Can you post screenshots of the zone settings, including advanced settings, for the zones that you posted for soil moisture.
With that information someone here can probably help.
Allowed Depletion and the moisture graphs don’t follow the same scale. AD is AD, but the moisture graph starts at whatever your AD is set at, and goes until “full saturation”. So 0% on the moisture graph would actually be 50% AD.
I know it can seem a little counterintuitive, but at the end of the day, these are just visual figures anyway. Your actual soil moisture levels aren’t sitting anywhere near 50-100%.
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The graph looks like it’s working right. The moisture level /would/ dip below 0% on 5/14, so it plans on watering that day. All variables look okay to me.
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Yes, trying to visualize the basic concepts here - to understand when (and why) Rachio will water my lawn.
Blossom would water nearly daily, even when actively raining…the reason I upgraded to Rachio.
There was .45" of precipitation on May 10 and the next scheduled run for this zone is May 14 so 4 days later. That seems about right to me too.
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So, looking at the moisture chart, what would I read as the trigger for the next watering event on 5/14?
Moisture balance at or near zero? Not clear what today’s 35% number represents relative depletion level…
Correct, unless you have restrictions on days the system can water, then it will change things up a bit.
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On your soil moisture chart the zone will end May 13 with .04 or 7% of moisture (remember that in the chart 0% = 50% of Allowed Depletion). The CE or crop evapotranspiration is forecast to be 0.14 on May 14 so that would mean the zone would end May 14 below the 50% allowed depletion or 0% chart level and so Rachio schedules the zone to be watered. Notice on May 14 there is .5 under irrigation.
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