S4 ● E35 Sending water everywhere: Field lines and no-dig Market Garden irrigation

So the sun's returned and we've got a week of glorious weather ahead of us, it looks like. And I've been putting in the field line today and checking for leaks, making sure we can bring automatic water to the birds who are out on pasture today. I'm up here at the top of top field and I've just turned the water on at the barn over there. So there's different valves along each tree line, quick release valves like this one. These are the keys that release water and we have them attached to gas hoses. And so my job today now is just turning this on and checking all the connections for leaks for from the winter, from any disturbances. So now there's water coming out and you see there's some residue that's just clearing out. So once that's running without air, I'm just going to release this valve and walk back down along the line checking all the connections there. It's very nice in the water system here because the lowest point is on the road down here. I'm actually at the exact same elevation as the barn here, but the lowest point in the line is down over the road here, which is where the stream is. So we have a drain point there for the winter we just drain the pipes and off we go. So water is coming out clear. I just release that peg and I've got a tap here that's off because this line goes off right up to the pigs and into the forest there. So we're using gas line which is 8 millimetre internal. And gas line is far more preferable to hose pipe because it's thinner diameter. So this is a 100 meter roll that fits on a pretty small reel. And we've got these little four wheel buggies this year because it just makes moving the water lines between the fields and down the lines of the fence lines much easier. And so the quick release just fits onto the waterline at the edge of the field and goes through this rotating valve there and has a quick release at the other end here which plugs into the water in the chickens or the boiler pans, etc. So the field lines run along the edge of each field with a quick release point in the middle of each tree lane and then we can easily bring water out to the birds. I'm just going to install the one on the top eggmobile there. So once you've decided that you really want to regenerate grass and you want to manage animals holistically, moving animals around to make sure grasses are never overgrazed You've then got to deal with the logistics and the infrastructure to make that practical. So solar portable fencing and like solar energizers with portable netting and things like this reel makes things much easier. You can just plug into the water line there and off we go. We don't have to move water around. Moving things around takes a lot of time on the farm, and so placing things in the right location and making the flows of things like water automatic just make life a lot easier. And that ultimately transcends to having more time in the day. It went really well. It's great to see the cows and the sheep back together again and have the lambs outside now after the long winter, it's really not ideal to move sheep with young lambs a long distance, but we decided the benefit of them being outdoors outweighed the stress. And we were very careful to keep them all together in a tight group so they wouldn't get stressed leaving the lambs behind. But we're over at the neighbour's land now and we're going to be grazing in his paddocks. There's a few hectares over here, but the grass hasn't really started growing so much. We're going to be transitioning them off their winter feed over the next week or so. And the warm weather's come back, so grass is really going to start growing now. We're using these nice fences with the plastic uprights, which are working really well, especially good for young lambs, and they don't get tangled up in them. But I think they've got used to the fence now that we can go to regular netting also. And so we'll be moving through here with three nets. So it's 150 meters of netting and making sure they've got enough forage and supplementing with some hay if they need it, if there's not so much grass. These paddocks aren't as good as our land. They've just not had animals for many, many years, decades, actually. And we're hoping to start improving the grass through planned grazing and probably we can use this grass well into the future. So really nice to see the animals out and they look very happy to be out in the glorious sunshine today. So it's great to have the birds happy and comfortable and they should start laying their first eggs in a couple of weeks. And it will take some weeks until they go into a smooth production. See the berry fruits are coming into leaf. These are these wonderful Ben Lomonds, really big thumbnail size blackcurrants the trees are just starting to bud. This is a Morella cherry that Gracie likes to usually finish off before any of us find them. Yeah, we're just up here testing the irrigation system for the market gardens that runs up from the pond. We're to just going got a simple siphon here that runs over the wall of the pond that irrigates the market guns. We'll go up there and have a look at that. So everything seems to be working good up here. We set these up with different lengths of pipe so they can fit. We're in the south beds here and one 10 meter length that connects the two risers is enough to irrigate the whole of this. And we have a different assembly for the east and west beds up here and different assemblies for the north beds which take all four rises. Matt, what's been going in the garden now? Kale, broccolis, kohlrabbies, lots of direct seeded peas that just got a row cover and laid flat over them until they germinate. Bunch more salad mixes to go in. Bunch more direct seeding. I'm going to give you a proper update on the gardens very soon. That's it for today folks. I'm really looking forward to some sunny weather now and get a bit of tan on my face after the winter. Don't forget to hit subscribe if you like our videos and share them with your friends. It really helps to grow the channel, expose more people to small scale regenerative agriculture. You can find out a lot more in our book Making Small Farms Work. And don't forget to follow the Kickstarter of Olivia Asselin's projects. The Gracie's Backyard film that's up and coming this well as soon as the Kickstarter is finished and funded. It'll be pretty quick before the video comes out and you can watch it. So thanks for your time and see you next time.