I'd like to set up a drip irrigation system for watering our raised vegetable garden beds (and maybe eventually other flower beds). I've been looking into kits from dripworks, etc. and want to set it up with a timer. Ideally, I'd like to hook up the system to the rain barrel when full, and switch to the faucet when it's empty. I also like the idea of filling up the rain barrel and only using that when we are out of town- something about leaving on a faucet when we are away makes me nervous, although I know people do it! The rain barrel and faucet are only ~10 feet away from eachother or so. The problem is, it seems that most timers are made for one or the other- the zero pressure gravity fed timers or high pressure. Is there a type that would work for both systems? .

Also, since the faucet/rain barrel is several feet away from my first bed, I was wondering how to deal with the mainline when mowing the lawn. Have folks buried their main line, or do you just detach when mowing?

You could use garden hose as your main line and move it when you mow.

You can connect your system to use the rain barrel at all times. Use your garden hose to manually fill up the rain barrel when needed. Or you could even use a float valve to automatically top off the rain barrel from the hose. Then everything would be zero pressure.

I think a hose timer will work OK with zero pressure. So you could have branch A be main line, back-flow preventer, pressure reducer, hose bib A. Branch B would be water barrel, hose bib B. Connect the hose timer to hose bib A when you are home, and hose bib B when you are out. Don't forget to turn on the hose bib before you go on vacation!

If you can get your rain barrel 10 feet above your garden, everything will work much better. If you only have one or two feet of pressure, even drip irrigation might not work very well.

I believe most drip irrigation is designed to work at 5 psi (hopefully someone will correct me if I am wrong). That is like 11 feet of water pressure, I believe.

--McKenzie