By Jim McCausland, Sunset Magazine
“Simple, but not easy” is how Robert Kourik sets things up in Drip Irrigation For Every Landscape and All Climates (Metamorphic Press, Occidental, CA, 2009; $24.95). That’s an apt description: the basics of drip are simple to understand, but assembling the parts can be work.
Fortunately, Kourik has (literally) been in the trenches before you, and shows the way with humor and common sense. If you follow his lead in putting your garden on drip, you’ll cut your water use in half, have healthier and (very often) more productive plants, and probably reduce your garden’s weed problems in the bargain. But more important than all these, you'll not lose your mind in the process.
About 60 percent larger than the first edition, Drip Irrigation . . . shows how to set up everything from drip for potted plants to full-on systems that can water every plant in your landscape. Kourik explains how to adapt your system to handle water from rain barrels, from gray water collection systems, and from cisterns.
The book has extra value because Kourik knows plants as well as he knows plumbing. His last book, Roots Demystified, explores what goes on underground when plants take up water and nutrients. Drip Irrigation . . . has an evapotranspiration (ET) section about what happens to the water after the roots take it in. When you understand these things, it's easy to figure out how to tune your irrigation system to your plants.
Along the way, Kourik gives you a list of suppliers (he's not connected with any of them), a glossary, and The Official List of Pop Murphy's Laws—truisms like "The thought, 'Just one more twist,' instantly produces a cracked pipe or leaky thread." You can see where this is going. Fun book, great info. Buy it and save the world's water supply. To save shipping and taxes, order direct from robertkourik.com.
