Meters a step to irrigation efficiency

A simple installation of data logging meters is the first step towards more efficient irrigation management for Dairy farmer Neil Brown.  Neil’s 280ha dairy operation consists of two farms running three well pumps in the Chertsey ground water zone. Working with Andrew Neil of WaterMetrics, Neil installed ECan approved MagMeters. The meters will record pumping rate both in real time, and cumulatively via inbuilt data loggers.

“Before installing the meters we had to go on guess work. We can’t go over our take allowance, but we did not have accurate data on how much water we were actually using each season. Nor did we know if the pumps were actually drawing the amount they were designed for.”

Digital read outs on the MagMeters provide assurance to Neil and his staff the pumps are performing as intended, and the cumulative data will prove invaluable for both management and compliance purposes in coming years.
Neil views the meters as stage one of a two stage process in installing irrigation technology on his properties. The next step will be to connect them remotely via telemetry systems provided by WaterMetrics to a farm computer, along with Aquaflex soil moisture and temperature sensors.

From here a profile of the farms’ water use over the season given moisture, temperature and rainfall conditions can be established, helping make more informed irrigation decisions.
Meantime the meters’ data logging capacity is a valuable compliance tool that Neil believes will ultimately be compulsory. They have already made compliance simpler.

“ECan were going to come out to check on our take and when I told them we had data loggers they will now come at the end of the season and simply plug into the loggers to get our total take for the period.”

Future ECan irrigation consents are being based on farm usage, rather than rolling over existing allowances. Having the meters provides hard data to ECan when consent conditions are renewed about what exactly the farm requires.

“Having the meters provides real proof of what we need. If we did not have them we would only get a standard text book allowance. The meters mean we can argue for a realistic allowance, based on hard data.”