Speakers at the Irrigated Agriculture in Arizona Conference, from left, included meteorologist Paul Brown, University of Arizona, Tucson; plus Arizona farmers Arnott Duncan, Duncan Family Farms, Goodyear; and Terry and Ramona Button, Ramona Farms, Sacaton.
Entrepreneurial ways to survive Half a dozen farmers took to the podium at the Irrigated Ag event to discuss their farming plans and strategies to share their efforts in water conservation and cropping systems, including Central Arizona farmers Arnott Duncan of Duncan Family Farms based at Goodyear and Dan Thelander of Tempe Farm Company who farms around Maricopa.
“During the winter, we turn on the same sprinklers to help control frost.” Water is also used to “lubricate the soil.” Since harvest occurs one-half inch above the soil line, the wet soil helps reduce the amount of field removed with the crop at harvest.
“Trying to hold water and nutrients in the soil is greatly enhanced by increasing the organic matter.” Today, Duncan’s water conservation practices utilize a high pressure main line manifold irrigation system with sprinkler valves pre-set for the right distance to provide the highest application efficiency.
In the future, Duncan Farms aims to save additional water by using plant and soil sensors to automate irrigation events.
“The potential for water shortage is something that we are definitely very worried about and are trying to plan for,” said Thelander who then asked, “How do you plan for water shortages?” This year’s Thelander cropping system includes about 1,600 acres of Desert Durum wheat; 2,200 acres of alfalfa including 400 acres in drip irrigation; and 250 acres of guayule (natural rubber plant) farmed with drip.
About 1,000 acres of cotton includes about 400 acres each irrigated by drip and furrow, plus about 200 acres of double cropped cotton following wheat.
Thelander says alfalfa prices have dropped $50-$75 per ton over the last several years; the wheat price is down $400 per hundredweight; and the cotton price is up.
However, Thelander quipped that the higher cotton price around 70 cents per pound at press time was the same cotton price when he started farming more than 40 years ago.
Thelander says, “If a farmer can grow a higher water use crop that’s also a high value crop then the farmer might be able to fallow acres to irrigate the more profitable crop.” Overall, the end result could be, even with fallowed land, an overall profit.