Solar Plant Watering Drip System
There are two separate floating home communities on either side of the marina; one upstream and one downstream. A floating home is very similar to a regular home but the difference is it floats. The marina and the floating home communities are not connected to each other so it’s an easy kayak paddle around the edge of the marina docks into the open channel. During one of our first kayaking adventures (see more about our kayaks here!) out on the channel we noticed that some floating homes have patio planters without soil. The roots of the plants, or in some cases large bushes and small trees, go straight down into the water. This got us to thinking, Yara is our floating home and we have plants at our slip, so how could we water them with natural river water?
We could dip a watering can into the water and water the plants. But that would mean we’d have to remember to do it and it takes time. And we’d have to actually be here to water the plants. Plus who wants to bend down that far to scoop up water? :) So then we had the thought…since Yara has a water pump for our house water pressure system to take fresh water out of our tanks and into our faucets, couldn’t we use a water pump to supply river water to the potted plants? Bingo! Our idea was born.
We’d rig up a pickup tube down into the river water, connect it to a pump, and then use a drip irrigation system to supply water to the plants. And while doing our research for a pump, timer, hose, battery, solar panel, drip irrigation system, etc. we discovered this wasn’t a novel idea. Complete kits for exactly what we want to do are already available. Adding up the cost of all the individual pieces overran the cost of simply buying the complete kit. So that’s what we did. We purchased this one:
The kit has an internal pump, battery, and timer all built into the one unit. And power is supplied by a small solar panel. It was relatively easy to set-up, although there were challenges with the instructions, we eventually got it working the way we want. The kit comes as a complete kit but the only extra bit we purchased was an additional length of hose as we had some long runs:
With the amount of rain we’ve had so far this spring, we look forward to those warm summer days while we’re off kayaking (or when we can get Yara off this dock!). We wont have to worry about the plants getting enough water. Added bonus, we strongly suspect the plants will prefer the river water compared to the dockside water that is treated for safe drinking. Now that’s a yacht of love!
Video Link: https://youtu.be/TcZ7sMr5lWE
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