There are few things that make a property look better than a full and lush lawn. Installing a commercial irrigation system is a good first step towards keeping your business’s lawn in beautiful and healthy condition.
However, lawn care maintenance doesn’t end with the installation of the commercial irrigation system.
You’ll need to properly maintain the irrigation system if you want it to keep the lawn healthy and green for years to come.
Far too often, property owners install an irrigation system, but then fail to keep up with the system’s required maintenance. They may get too busy with their business or they may feel that the cost of maintaining the irrigation system is prohibitive.
While there are some costs associated with maintaining commercial irrigation systems, those costs are very necessary. Without the proper maintenance, an irrigation system can become damaged and inefficient. In the worst case scenario, the system could require a major repair or even replacement. That would likely cost far more money than performing a few simple maintenance steps every year.
Here are some of the most important and necessary costs in maintaining a commercial irrigation system:
Winterization – Winterization is critical in New Jersey. A lack of winterization is one of the leading causes of damaged irrigation systems. When you don’t winterize your system, you run the risk of water building up in the pipes during the cold winter months. That water could freeze and ultimately cause your irrigation pipes to crack or even burst.
Winterization is the process of shutting down your irrigation system and removing any residual water that may be left in the pipes. It should be done in the fall before there’s any chance of an early-season freeze. The process involves shutting off your system, insulating your shut-off valve, removing your backflow preventer and flushing or draining any remaining water from the system. If you don’t have experience with this, it’s worth it to have a professional lawn irrigation contractor handle it. Failure to properly winterize your pipes could leave you with a useless irrigation system after just one winter cold snap.
Spring Startup – Just as the system needs to be properly shutdown before winter, it also needs to be started up the right way in the spring. Many people believe they can just turn their water back on, but that’s often not the case.
During the colder months, many small animals and insects, especially spiders, will attempt to use the irrigation system as shelter.
While they’ll often find that the pipes aren’t large enough to accommodate them, that doesn’t prevent them from stuffing the pipes with food, grass, sticks, and other natural materials. All of that stuff needs to be removed before you turn your water back on.
Additionally, your backflow preventer may need to be reinstalled, and the system should be checked for any cracks, holes or other deficiencies that were caused during the winter. Again, a knowledgeable professional can usually get your irrigation system up and running relatively quickly.
Backflow certification – Your irrigation system has to have a working and certified backflow preventer to keep contaminated water from entering your business’s drinking water systems.
Irrigation systems often spray water onto lawns and landscaping that have been treated with hazardous materials like fertilizer and weed killer. Irrigations systems will then draw on that same water and reprocess it to reuse. Understandably, there are regulations in place designed to prevent backflow from the lawn and landscaping from mixing with drinking water.
A backflow preventer is installed to make sure the system complies with backflow regulations. Since the backflow preventer is sometimes removed during winterization, a certified professional needs to make sure it is working properly every spring.
Zone testing – Do you ever notice that one area of your business’s lawn or landscaping just doesn’t seem to get as much water as it should? It could be that the original layout of your sprinkler isn’t appropriate for your company’s current landscaping. As part of routine maintenance on the commercial irrigation system, an irrigation expert could test your sprinklers to make sure they’re hitting the right areas with the right amount of water. If not, you may need to move the location of some of your sprinkler heads.
Routine maintenance – Aside from winterization and spring startup, your system should be checked a couple times each year to make sure there are no problems with the system. Animals can get stuck in pipes. Cracks can form even outside of the winter months. Things happen that can leave your commercial irrigation system running at a less than optimal performance. It’s always less expensive to identify and repair these problems early rather than later. If you wait too long, they could expand into much larger problems that threaten the viability of your entire commercial irrigation system.
Commercial irrigation system maintenance may feel like an unnecessary expense. However, by regularly taking care of your system, you’ll ensure that it’s operational for years to come. You may also prevent major damage and save a significant amount of money. One of the best ways to take care of your business’s lawn is to take care of your commercial irrigation system.
