Skip to content

Irrigation by crop

Irrigation for sweet orange

Mosambi and acid lime at 5-6 m spacing, on online drip like the rest of Telangana’s citrus — drippers around the tree, not water at the trunk.

Suits it best

Drip irrigation

Usual row spacing

5–6 m

Water need

2–6.5 mm/day

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

Why drip irrigation

Trees 5-6 m apart, on online drip like the rest of Telangana’s citrus, with drippers that keep water off the trunk.

A lateral down each tree row, rows 5–6 m apart, with 4 drippers at every tree.

What actually changes the answer

  • Water standing at the trunk invites foot rot. Drippers set out under the canopy keep the collar dry.
  • At 6 × 6 m an acre holds about 110 trees — four drippers each on a single lateral, until the orchard is old enough for two.
  • Citrus is in leaf all year, so the summer peak in April and May is what the water source has to meet.

How much pipe would sweet orange 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

Drip 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.

← All crops

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.