Lining a pond and drip watering rice fields etc.

[notrub]

13 02 2020

 

We have about 25 rai of rice fields in Isaan with 2 ponds and a well and solar pump setup already.  I want to pump and fill the pond but am told when the ground is dry the water just quickly soaks away.  There is a water problem every year.  Paddy system for rice uses about 5000 M3 per tonne of rice.  Drip irrigation uses about 1500M3 per tonne.  (https://www.netafim.com/en/crop-knowledge/rice/ among many sites to see this info.)

 

Question 1.  How about lining a pond?  does it have to be a one piece liner or can it be laid down in sheets with the joints sealed by a gummy tape?  I have done this with flat roofs and know how that works.  No need for hot tar etc..  Does this exist in Thailand?

Q2  There are many machines to row plant rice.  If I bought such a machine and hired a tractor to seed, do you think I could rent it to other farmers?

Q3  what are the costs involved in buying and laying the black drip feed pipe per 10 rai (for example) and what are the problems to look out for please?

 

There is the thought that there will be a drought this year and Isaan is expected to be hardest hit.  This is not going away and I feel the need to prepare for the future. 

 

That's a lot of questions and I will be grateful for any comments.  Thank you.

 

[khwaibah]

What part of isaan as isaan is half the size of Germany and conditions change. Saying that I'm in lower Surin/Kap Choeng and my wife has said fork rice and has gone a different direction. Our water table is about 3 meters down so her first requirement was a 50 meter square x 10 meter deep pond and no it is not lined. Check out my thread. 

 

[IsaanAussie]

I am a bit further east in Sisaket and have started looking at water for our rice farm. Start with rainfall, how much rain do you get during the season. This chart shows about ten years of rain in our Amphoe of Khukhan. Note 2019 was apparently very high rainfall, much more than I though.

The period between May and September we get almost all our annual rain. Over the period shown the rain totals some 800 mm average per wet season. Last year we had over 2 metres (spectical?) but lost the surplus to run off. That is what I need to fix. That sort of surplus is going into recharging the groundwater in the future if I can manage it. 

10mm of rain per hectare totals 100,000 litres or 100 cubic metres, therefore a total volume of 8,000 cubic metres per hectare in my area. 

My rule of thumb is I need about 500mm of water per crop. This year I start keeping data including daily rainfall, rate of infiltration and rate of evaporation. 

[khwaibah]

Had three weeks of rain in September and that was it. Zero before and zero since then and I'm just west of you. Saying that with water table being at 3 meters and the run off from the paddies someones dream is coming true. As for charts they are like political polls.???? I look for another dry season.????

 

This has given her what she wants

Organic rice.

Irrigation.

????????

[CGW]

The first thing i would be looking at is the return from 25 Rai of rice, is investment in a crop worthwhile?

[khwaibah]

The rain we received was the last week in August and the first two weeks in September. 

 

This was September 4 and you can see the run off from the paddies.

 

September 10

 

[IsaanAussie]

Khukhan rain was 800mm Aug and 630mm in Sept, so if anywhere near that you had enough to fill the paddies well past the draining depth. How high at the drains set above the paddy surface? Love what you guys have done with irrigating (distribution). No need for pumps etc.. 

 

[khwaibah]

The drainage lines are about 4 inches above the paddies. The irrigation lines are connect to me bosses anniversary gift from last year.???? This photo is August 5 last and you see the pump. You can see the water is about 6 foot below the very top berm which is a road way. and it also has drainage lines in stalled. The land on the other side is the wife uncles. The pond aka lake top out over the berm and into his paddies. WBTW he now has about 3 rai of sweet corn growing and gets to use his nieces pond for irrigation.????

 

[khwaibah]

To your right and just above the floor of he further coffee and steak house you can see a brown pressure pump we had spare. I be stuffed.???? It works like a champ and takes care of about 3 rai.???? Photo January 30.

 

Edited February 13, 2020 by khwaibah

[IsaanAussie]

4" above the patty, perfect, thanks for the confirmation. That is my target depth for our rice.

I have to try to get a bit closer to the potential you have with that pond 25,000 cubic metres, not much chance of that.

Regardless, if I want to get rice growing prior to the usual late start of June-July, I have to use groundwater to moisten the paddies prior to preparation. After that May rains have to be managed to replace the groundwater as well as keep the paddies with some flood water. 

[khwaibah]

1 hour ago, IsaanAussie said:

After that May rains????

Hope your correct but I well not hold my breath.????

[IsaanAussie]

Just now, khwaibah said:

Hope your correct but I well not hold my breath.????

Right or wrong at least I hope to learn something. All I have at the moment is the Khukhan rain data, that is 13 km's from me and with the micro climates here who knows how close? Looking at what your wife has done gives me confidence to think I can grow the rice and then get some usage from the land during the dry season.

[Grumpy John]

On 2/13/2020 at 3:02 PM, IsaanAussie said:

Khukhan rain was 800mm Aug and 630mm in Sept, so if anywhere near that you had enough to fill the paddies well past the draining depth. How high at the drains set above the paddy surface? Love what you guys have done with irrigating (distribution). No need for pumps etc.. 

 

Wow!  Pretty impressive rainfall.  The best we have had is one month of 362mm the year I  started recording rainfall.  As part of our future plan we will be putting a tank next to the newly enlarged dam at the orchard.  Back in Oz curved corrugated iron tanks were common when I was a kid.   I said to Tik we could make one ourselves......then the other day I  was looking at a Dutch Greenery brochure and there it was!  Their version has a plastic lid.....which is OK I  suppose.  On another note I posted last week we had a bore pump installed and the guy wanted to run it for 24hours to make sure there was enough water, I said to Tik pigs arz we will, I am not wasting all that water!  She says "it OK we Are going to put the water in Auntie Na's dam"........which we did.  2 days later we riding past and I  see a hose connected to the bore pipe.  I stop to investigate and that's when I was told Auntie wants another 24 hours worth to water the corn........  From that point the conversation got ugly!  I don't give a flying f#$K if she is related no-one is using our bore we paid for even if they give us a few baht for electricity.   That's one thing I hate about Thai's, they can be total users.  And Tik finds it hard to say NO!   From now on it's not we paid for the bore,  I paid for the bore which means there is no fuss when she says no. 

[IsaanAussie]

Arh Grumpy (aka John Elliot of Fosters fame- Pigs Arz), haven't heard that expression for years. 

1,000m3 that is one big tank. How did the bore perform, how many litres per day did it yield?

The thing that frustrates me, is the passion Thais have for fishing out a pond by pumping all the water out around New Year. Put the water into another pond or into a recharge well in the ground at least, not just out on the surface. I asked my missus why they bother having a pond when they waste the water. The answer was so obvious, I shouldn't have asked. "No pond, no fish"

 

[canuckamuck]

Drip tape is great when its the right application, I can't imagine how you will make it work for rice though. Your rice field will be wall to wall drip tape, and what are you going to do with it when you need to till the soil or cut the rice. It isn't much fun rolling up those 500m rolls. I assume the cost of purchasing the drip tape will eliminate any profit for years to come.

[IsaanAussie]

16 hours ago, canuckamuck said:

Drip tape is great when its the right application, I can't imagine how you will make it work for rice though.

On 2/13/2020 at 9:59 AM, notrub said:

Question 1.  How about lining a pond?  does it have to be a one piece liner or can it be laid down in sheets with the joints sealed by a gummy tape?  I have done this with flat roofs and know how that works.  No need for hot tar etc..  Does this exist in Thailand?

Q2  There are many machines to row plant rice.  If I bought such a machine and hired a tractor to seed, do you think I could rent it to other farmers?

Q3  what are the costs involved in buying and laying the black drip feed pipe per 10 rai (for example) and what are the problems to look out for please?

Well done Canuckamuck, we haven't done much to answer Notrub's questions. 

Lining Ponds usual method is to use bentonite clay to line the pond. There was a topic on here before including source and prices. 

 

Here is a link that describes how it is used. https://pondwiki.com/sealing-a-pond-with-bentonite/

Renting Seed Drill for others to use, not for me. The return would be minimal (200baht a rai for tractor and plough) and the chance it wouldn't get "played with", remote. 

Drip tape - Not applicable to rice in my book. 

 

 

Edited February 15, 2020 by IsaanAussie

[CLW]

Have you looked into this method to save irrigation water: System of Rice Intensification (SRI)

[IsaanAussie]

Just now, CLW said:

Have you looked into this method to save irrigation water: System of Rice Intensification (SRI)

Absolutely. My issue is to be able to capture, store and control the maximum amount of rain water we get so I can grow other crops during the dry season. Draining and flooding of SRI style paddies is the easy bit as long as you have somewhere to store the water with a minimum loss due to evaporation and percolation. During the two peak months of rain, the issue is to limit run off losses. 

[Grumpy John]

On 2/14/2020 at 5:30 PM, IsaanAussie said:

Arh Grumpy (aka John Elliot of Fosters fame- Pigs Arz), haven't heard that expression for years. 

1,000m3 that is one big tank. How did the bore perform, how many litres per day did it yield?

The thing that frustrates me, is the passion Thais have for fishing out a pond by pumping all the water out around New Year. Put the water into another pond or into a recharge well in the ground at least, not just out on the surface. I asked my missus why they bother having a pond when they waste the water. The answer was so obvious, I shouldn't have asked. "No pond, no fish"

 

Well it kept pumping out water but at the moment I got no idea how much in terms of litres,  but the electric bin is on the table and it's 524baht instead of the usual 42 baht......which Auntie can pay forthwith!  When I plumb the bore to the shed I can time how long it takes to  fill the 2 x IBCs.  I think we have space for a 200 cubicM tank.....after rainy season and the dirt pile settles. 

[Elkski]

It's fun to read about this and I had to laugh at John's anger Auntie wanted to pump a little more.  Reminds me of my girlfriend's mom who let the village cows eat all the stubble off of her 12 rai without  payment.  Mom has cows too.   Of course mom needs daughters support but I say if mom didnt give away cow grazing and also most of her rice to all the kin she would not need  daughter to give.  

I try to explain kin and village should be thanking my gf.  Seems to be a hot  topic.  

Edited February 19, 2020 by Elkski