At Home Living: Rain, rain gone away? Try a sprinkler system

Spring showers will soon be coming to an end, giving way to hotter temperatures here in Kansas. The rising mercury, along with drier conditions, will have many of us thinking about how were going to keep our lawns from turning brown this summer.

Investing in a sprinkler or lawn irrigation system is one way to keep the green grass growing. But how much green will have to come out of your pocket to pay for one?

According to Home Advisor, a home improvement website, the average cost nationally to install a sprinkler system is $2,675, with most homeowners spending between $2,282 and $3,068. The cost is dependent, according to the website, on the size of your lawn. A larger lawn, understandably, will require more pipes and sprinkler heads to be installed.

However, the price does not go up proportionally, according to Home Advisor. That is to say the cost of a sprinkler system for a property that is twice the size of another is not necessarily twice the price. This is because sprinkler systems run in zones.

A zone is an area with pipe and approximately 5 to 10 sprinkler heads, the website states. Once your system is installed and plumbed, adding zones is less expensive than installing a whole system. If you have a large property, and cannot afford to install an entire system everywhere at one time, you can consider installing the plumbing and the system and adding zones one at a time.

The quality of the pipes, sprinkler heads and timer is another factor that is calculated into the price of a lawn watering system.

Sprinkler heads in particular get the most active use and so should be chosen well, according to Home Advisor. What you try to save now in the cost of parts may end up hurting you in the long run in repair and replacement costs.

Pete Stauffer, owner of Stauffer Lawn and Landscape, in Auburn, for the past 14 years, said one of the biggest advantages of having a sprinkler system, rather than just watering your lawn by hand with a hose, is convenience.

Its fully automated and you can set it according to the weather and the types of plants and lawn you have, he said. You can also save on water because its a lot more precise.

Watering your lawn and plants is optimal in the mornings, Stauffer said. He also said watering early in the day, when the water pressure is sometimes better, gives the water the chance to soak into the ground but then evaporate soon enough so that the chances of mold or fungus forming are greatly diminished.

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At Home Living: Rain, rain gone away? Try a sprinkler system