Page 38 - Grapevine May-June 2020
P. 38
Around The Vineyard
Irrigation Best
Management Practices
By: Craig Macmillan, Macmillan Ag Consulting; Kris Beal, Vineyard Team;
Jacob Hernandez, JH Ag Consulting
The Project Irrigation system performance was measured using
a Distribution Uniformity evaluation (DU). A DU
V ineyard Team is a non-profit outreach evaluation measures pressures and flows at key
points in an irrigation system to calculate a DU
and education organization based in
Atascadero, California. The California
tion system efficiency.
Department of Water Resources (DWR) awarded score between 0 and 1.0 that correlates to irriga-
a grant to Vineyard Team in 2017 to study grower
adoption of irrigation best management practices Grower Irrigation Practices
in vineyards. Over three years 57 growers were
recruited into the project. An irrigation inter- Following growers for several years revealed
view was conducted with the growers creating an best management practices for maintaining a high
inventory of current irrigation-related behaviors. Distribution Uniformity score and a well-functioning
Page 36 The Grapevine • May - June 2020 877-892-5332
Grapevine Main Pages GV050620_Layout 1-1 .indd 36 4/28/20 1:21 PM
