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Irrigation by crop

Irrigation for red gram

Mostly grown on rain, often as an intercrop with cotton. Irrigation here is protective: water at the two stages a dry spell damages most.

Suits it best

Sprinkler

Usual row spacing

0.9–1.5 m

Water need

3.5–5 mm/day

Water need is the crop’s daily use at full cover over Oct–Dec, at weather stations across Telangana and Andhra Pradesh — the spread is the season and the place.

Why sprinkler

Mostly rainfed. An irrigation at flowering and another at pod fill save the crop in a dry spell, and a sprinkler reaches over a crop this tall.

What actually changes the answer

  • Flowering and pod fill are the stages to protect. In a dry year, an irrigation at each is what makes the difference.
  • Rows 0.9-1.5 m apart and a crop up to two metres tall — a sprinkler clears it where rain pipe would not.
  • Red gram dies quickly in waterlogged soil. A light sprinkler irrigation is safer than running water down the furrows.

How much pipe would red gram need?

Put in your acres and the estimator works it out against this crop’s layout, then prices the parts from our own catalogue at today’s prices.

Estimate my system

What you’d be buying

Sprinkler IrrigationLDPE Pipes

Spacings and layouts on this page are published package-of-practice and state-scheme figures; water need is FAO-56’s crop-coefficient method on published Telangana and Andhra Pradesh weather records. Neither is a design for your field — soil, slope, water source and pump all move them. Send us your crop, acres and pump details and we’ll confirm the sizing before you commit.

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Where these numbers come from

  • PJTSAU (opens in a new tab)

    Telangana’s state agricultural university — the package of practices crop spacings in the state follow.

  • TNAU Agritech Portal (opens in a new tab)

    Crop-wise spacing, water requirement and drip layout references for southern India.

  • ICAR (opens in a new tab)

    Indian Council of Agricultural Research — crop agronomy and regional package-of-practices.

  • Telangana Micro Irrigation Project (opens in a new tab)

    The state scheme’s guidelines: which crops go on inline drip, online drip or sprinklers, and the spacings it funds.

  • FAO Irrigation and Drainage Paper 56 (opens in a new tab)

    The reference method for crop evapotranspiration and crop coefficients that daily water figures derive from.