With all the rains in the past few months (more in the first quarter of the year than our entire annual “normal”) you are seeing weeds grow like crazy, plant flora come back to life with green hill sides, super blooms, and happy flowers. Thankfully, your irrigation systems should have been off for a few months as the drought scorched earth soaked up all that water and with that you are hopefully seeing lower water bills. But spring is upon us! We will likely see a few more rain showers (April showers bring May flowers after all), but as the temperatures rise, and the rain dries up, we start cranking up the irrigation systems again.
So when you notice a few more charges from your landscaping provider between April and September, you can’t say no one warned you… Your sprinkler system has been off for months, now all of a sudden, it is being violently thrown into high gear. There are bound to be problems.
What we are actually doing at LaBahn’s Landscaping is a very slow start. We turn on every station for a few minutes to test each station.
Over the last few months, sprinkler heads have been kicked off, drip lines have been disconnected, valve seals have broken, lateral lines have cracked, sediment has crept into the system, and any number of other things that could have happened, happened. So when we turn that system on for the first time in three months, often we find things that absolutely MUST be repaired. Broken sprinkler heads, lateral lines, main lines, and drip irrigation are all major causes for concern as that contributes to water waste. These are emergencies and must be repaired immediately. Damaged wiring, fried solenoids, or broken time clocks (believe it or not, time clocks are like any other electronic, they have a lifespan) are not as urgent; but they are equally as important! They are not as urgent because when these things break, typically water is simply not running. So at least we aren’t wasting water (contributing to our water shortages and high water bills), but if plant material isn’t getting the water it needs, you might be damaging one of your most valuable assets, you plant and tree material.
It is important to remember, higher water bills, and increases in irrigation repair, while maybe not welcomed this time of year, should certainly be expected as your plant material will start to need water, and your irrigation systems are being repaired to do their job as efficiently as they can. At LaBahn’s Landscaping we do our best to communicate the issues we find BEFORE you receive a bill (or an angry resident/tenant phone call), hence the purpose of this blog/newsletter/social media posting. Some of our clients opt for an irrigation “pre-approval” so we can fix issues on the same service day, and ensure that watering of plant material is done properly. We highly recommend this option. If, however, you choose to “wait-and-approve” that is completely understandable. No matter what your preference, we make every effort to communicate all needed repairs and issues as often as we are able to.
If we can ever provide you with an irrigation survey, maintenance bid, or design-build proposal, we are ready and willing to go to work for you. You can TEXT Nathan Cornett directly (619-823-5974), or you can CONTACT US through our website.
We are a LOCAL family owned and operated landscaping organization that has serviced San Diego County since 1984. We have more than 120 team members with a full suite of services for our clients including Design, Build, and Maintain services. LaBahn’s Landscaping was founded by Mike and Julie LaBahn in 1984 and their daughter Joanna LaBahn-Cornett is at the helm as CEO after working every position in the business. The executive team has more than 100 combined years in landscaping maintenance and construction management. We are big enough for any job you have, and small enough to care about every client. We look forward to working for YOU!