A deep orange sun hangs low on the horizon as Raul surveys his fields. Stretching out below, a golden expanse, a source of pride, and until recently, intense stress. Farming is always a gamble with the weather gods. Some seasons are dry; waiting for rains to keep the soil intact and green shoots moving upwards.
A few seasons ago, Raul took a leap of faith, embracing pivot irrigation systems to mitigate the variable rain water supply during hot summers. It is a different kind of gamble, taking significant chunks of not so liquid cash to set up and run. This new gamble has to pay off in better yields because the bank takes no stock in failed projects.
The margins are tight. He looked at a linear pipe run, but his crop fields were smaller. The ground is not all level and the soil a mix of different consitencies, from sludgy muddy near the river bed to rocky and loose near the top end of the farm.
Raul took one further step. He upgraded the pivot he bought second hand from another local farmer with IoT remote control, pressure and flow monitoring plus soil, air, and temperature sensors. He was already doing rain water harvesting and was invested in high quality wheat production, hoping for premium prices at harvest time.
The tech upgrade didn’t take much effort to do. He was interested in how it would work within the other systems he was using, so the curiosity to experiment was already there.
The turning point
Before the change in approach, Raul relied mainly on guesswork and intuition. He has a hand held moisture sensor and a good weather eye for is happening in the sky. That, plus the met service long range forecast and local news are the main assets.
Before, if a pivot slowed down or an older nozzle clogged in fertigration, he found out later, usually when the wheat began to show signs of discoloration. Leaks meant pressure drops, wasted water and uneven coverage. Now he gets a notification on his phone, based on anomalies in the analytics.
From his desktop monitoring station, he checks:
- Water pressure and flow rates: Sensors highlight inefficiencies instantly, so no more wasted water dripping onto barren ground.
- Moisture levels in the soil: A network of ground sensors tells him exactly how much water the wheat needs, and where. Raul’s land is good for the most part, but his soil type slightly varies in different fields.
- Pivot speed and position: He can track the system’s movements and adjust settings remotely to avoid over, or under, watering specific zones.
The smart farming model:
One morning, Raul got an alert about an anomaly in the system. A sensor had detected reduced water flow in one of the pivot arms. Instead of rushing out to inspect the entire system, he pulled up the dashboard. A clogged nozzle was the culprit. Raul dispatched his son to fix it.
Later in the season, when a dry spell hit, air temperature sensors and soil moisture monitoring combined with weather data helped Raul fine-tune the irrigation pattern. By syncing flow with the heat index, he ensured the wheat stayed hydrated during midday peak heat.
His ability to predict water need changes the dynamic between reacting to natural patterns and being able to implement strategies, getting the contractors in at the peak moment, tilling, sowing and harvesting and working on multi cropping, based on predictable results.
The bottom line
By reducing waste, conserving water, and improving crop health, these technologies aren’t just fancy tools, they provide the information to make better decisions in real-time.
You are probably guessing that “Raul” is not a “real” farmer, but an anecdotal means of explaining the usefulness of systematic investment in water distribution technologies. We run large scale irrigation projects. Those projects do not typically equate to the experience of a smaller farmer and a single pivot, drip irrigation run or pumping station, but the same priniciples apply. There is always a hose, a pipe, a resevoir of some kind, and a reason for getting a significant amount of water off or on to the land, depending on the season.
