Is Fertigation Good For My Garden? Pros and Cons
A mix of fertilization and irrigation, fertigation can be a garden game changer. Learn all about fertigation and decide if it is a good fit for your garden.
If you’ve never heard of fertigation before, don’t worry! By the time you’ve read this entire article you’ll basically be an expert, and you can decide whether it is something you want to use in your garden or not.
What Is Fertigation?
Well, as you may have guessed from the name, fertigation is a combination of fertilization and irrigation. This way of delivering nutrients to plants is most commonly used in hydroponic farming operations, because hydroponic systems use no soil at all and rely on water-soluble fertilizers to nourish crops. But fertigation has much broader application potential than hydroponic systems. Read on to learn all about how fertigation works, what options there are, and how to use it in your own garden.
How Fertigation Works
Many gardeners feed their plants with granulated, time-released fertilizers that are broadcast onto the soil surface. This approach, while convenient, poses a few problems. For one, it is very difficult to control or calculate the amount of fertilizer plants actually get, because a hard rainfall or lack of rain can affect the release of fertilizer to the soil. Another significant issue is that heavy rain can wash out the fertilizer into gutters and wastewater systems, contaminating waterways. Even gardeners who use organic means of fertilizing may find that the compost they use to top dress planting beds does not adequately feed the plants below because it takes a long time to work!
Fertigation solves these problems by delivering the two things plants need most at the same time. The principles behind fertigation are simple: by using fertilizer dissolved into water, plants receive a precise amount of nutrients directly to their root zones. Less fertilizer is wasted, and plants produce higher yields.
How and Where Is Fertigation Used?
Fertigation can be applied in several different ways:
- Overhead spray irrigation is something seen often in agriculture and in lawn sprinkler systems. Incidentally, lawns respond extremely well to fertigation, and are an ideal residential application of this method. A typical lawn should be fertigated up to four times per year, during the growing season.
- Hand-application system uses a siphon mixer that screws onto a hose bib and distributes a specific amount of water-soluble fertilizer into the water as it is sprayed from a nozzle. This is a practical way to use fertigation in a garden where a number of ornamental plants have the same nutrient requirements. It gives an exceptionally high level of control over which plants get fertilized and how much water and fertilizer they receive.
- Drip irrigation systems are commonly used in row crops and ornamental gardens, and offer the advantages of keeping leaves dry, minimizing evaporation, and eliminating issues with overspray. In order to fertigate in a drip system, you need a fertilizer injector system and a backflow preventer. This is an efficient way to fertigate gardens where most of the plants have similar nutrient needs.
In addition to being efficient, fertigation also allows you to more closely control the amount of microelements that are delivered to a garden—useful because these are expensive. Fertigation makes a lot of sense in agricultural settings where consistency and high crop yields are the top priorities and irrigation systems are already present. Farmers usually deal with large-scale areas where wasted fertilizer is detrimental to the environment and costly to the business. Fertigation is a straightforward way for agricultural growers to improve outcomes.
Drawbacks of Fertigation
Fertigation may not hold the same appeal for home gardeners that it does for farmers. Unlike an agricultural field, a garden contains many different types of plants, each with different, specific nutrient needs.
Corrosive Solutions
Chemical fertilizers applied in a spray irrigation system can be damaging to the paint on cars and houses, and fertilizer that isn’t properly dissolved into water can burn leaves that it’s been applied to.
Additional Equipment
To fertigate a lawn, you need to already have an irrigation system installed or are considering installing one. Irrigation systems can be expensive to install because they require lines, emitters, pumps, valves, and a controller—all of which typically must be installed by a licensed professional. Fertigation systems need to have a backflow preventer as well.
Local Restrictions
In drought-prone areas there may be restrictions on how often you can use irrigation in the summer, preventing you from fertigating when your lawn needs it most.
That being said, fertigation can be extremely effectively as long as it is used properly and on plants that have similar requirements.
Is Fertigation for You?
Despite drawbacks, fertigation can be an efficient way to feed lawns and gardens in some situations. If you have an existing lawn sprinkler system with a backflow preventer, then fertigation offers an excellent alternative to broadcasting granulated fertilizer onto the lawn. If you’ve struggled with coordinating the timing of your irrigation and fertilization in the past, then fertigation may provide you with the right balance of water and nutrients at the right time.
Hand fertigation is an expensive method for delivering nutrients to your ornamental beds. If you are a dedicated gardener, or if you live in a region where drought means water restrictions are a part of your life, this may be the ideal solution to your summer water limitations.
And for vegetable gardens with drip irrigation systems, fertigation can deliver the right nutrients to the roots of your plants, giving you an outstanding yield.
The bottom line is that fertigation has some very practical applications, and can be useful in the right setting. Do your research to decide if it is good for your garden.