Buried clay pots- 1/10th the water use of flood irrigation- anyone use them?

[sfbay-southfacingslope10a]

Ollas (buried clay pots) are one of the most water-efficient irrigation systems known and have been used for thousands of years across the world. The membrane of the clay pots is porous so allows water to travel slowly into the surrounding soil, reducing weed growth and using just 1/10th the water of conventional flood irrigation (50% of drip). Buried clay pots have been used successfully for many orchard trees such as citrus, pistachio, almonds, and other fruits and nuts.

I've put in many ollas of varying sizes at my house but mostly for annual vegetable gardening so far. I've found size matters big time. I have a few tropical/subtropical plants on ollas that are doing well: mangoes, cherimoya, banana, and pineapple, with plans to add more. Pretty much everything I've planted is within the last year so I can't say for sure what is a success yet and I'm hoping to learn from the success/failure of others. Water is crazy expensive here and while I capture rain water, storage space is limited and expensive. Looking forward to hearing any experiences!

[Greater Good]

Seen it used in a raised bed vegetable garden in Las Vegas

[FigoVelo]

I didn't know this was a thing outside of my yard. When I planted an orchard a few years ago, I was trying to think of ways to keep weeds down and direct water only to my trees. So, I buried a few clay pots with drainage holes and directed my drip emitters into them. I liked to think I invented a new system, but I guess I'm just Alfred Russel Wallace to Charles Darwin. Unfortunately, the system didn't work very well. The pots quickly filled in with soil and dirt. Plus, I had too many trees to install clay pots uphill of each one. I do believe, though, that if I had taken care of the system, it would have worked nicely.

[sfbay-southfacingslope10a]

Seen it used in a raised bed vegetable garden in Las Vegas

Very cool! My front yard in Oakland is basically a low-water demonstration garden (ollas, wicks, deep pipes, terraces and check logs). Too bad I live on a dead end street.

I didn't know this was a thing outside of my yard. When I planted an orchard a few years ago, I was trying to think of ways to keep weeds down and direct water only to my trees. So, I buried a few clay pots with drainage holes and directed my drip emitters into them. I liked to think I invented a new system, but I guess I'm just Alfred Russel Wallace to Charles Darwin. Unfortunately, the system didn't work very well. The pots quickly filled in with soil and dirt. Plus, I had too many trees to install clay pots uphill of each one. I do believe, though, that if I had taken care of the system, it would have worked nicely.

There's a 2,000 year old Chinese agriculture book by Fan Shengzhi detailing clay pot irrigation, so you are probably not the first. I'm really excited for more research to be done on ollas, some of the studies I've read are really promising (such as 20x melon yield per gallon of water when grown in India on ollas vs California with flood irrigation).