The article deals with the new technical facilities and technology of under-crown micro irrigation of orchards, vineyards, and fruit plantations, providing the increase of efficiency of the use of small plots of private households and farms, occupying a total area of 27.8 million ha. Those plots have an area from 0.01 ha to 40.0 ha of each plot and complex configuration, the peculiarities of terrain with the presence of various obstacles – low forest, roads, power lines, and others. The analysis of existing methods of irrigation, such as sprinkler, subsurface, surface, and drip irrigation, for above mentioned plantations was conducted. The areas of their application including small plots were defined. The advantages of under-crown micro irrigation of orchard crops using the new developed irrigation set were established. The proposed technology provides rational use of water, energy, and labor resources, maintenance of optimal moisture in a given calculated soil layer, yield increasing, and creation of normal ecological conditions in agricultural landscapes. The developed irrigation set for under-crown micro irrigation of orchard crops are presented in two modifications of ring open branches. The first one has ten holes with a diameter of 3 mm each; the second one has three deflector nozzles of sector action. The proposed system is mobile, reliable, and simple in operation. The module of irrigation set for under-crown micro irrigation comprises a distribution pipeline made of polyethylene pipes with diameter from 32 mm to 110 mm; two irrigation wings made of polyethylene pipes by quick dismountable construction, and sprinkler loops for connecting ring fingers. The conducted research and experimental-industrial tests of irrigation sets established the main technical and economic indicators, which values exceeded the existing analogs because of reliability and efficiency of the developed sets.
Keywords: micro irrigation, under-crown irrigation, irrigation set, sprinkler loops, ring fingers, low-intensive irrigation.
