ARCO, Idaho — An increasing number of farmers in eastern Idaho are revamping their pivot systems and adopting a new variation that helps them save water and energy while benefiting their crops.

Jesse Fullmer, team lead in the Natural Resources Conservation Service office in Arco, Idaho, has been helping producers change their pivots. His team covers three counties — Blaine, Butte and the southern portion of Custer County.

A producer in Arco was working with the University of Idaho experimenting with Low Elevation Spray Application irrigation known as LESA.

“They found potential for water savings, energy saving, improved disease control in crops and improved overall crop quality,” Fullmer said.

They talked with other producers and wrote a special initiative to focus on retrofiting existing MESA — mid-elevation spray application — systems, he said.

A standard pivot from a dealer today comes as a MESA, and some older pivots are even taller than these newer generation pivots.

“We were approved for special funding through the NRCS to retrofit existing pivots, lowering the nozzles to reduce evaporation loss,” he said. In the LESA package the water pressure is 10% to 15% less, he said.

“We also applied irrigation water management at an intermediate level, putting real-time data loggers in the soil to monitor at 1, 2 and 3 feet,” he said. This showed how much water was getting to those levels.

Conversations with producers revealed there was less lodging and disease in the heads of grain and barley, and less fungus on potato crops.

“They were seeing healthier and more consistent crops because the water was not applied as much on the crop canopy,” Fullmer said. “As those crops grew taller there was not as much water on top of the plants.”

There were several benefits from this change in water delivery.

“Now in our Arco office many producers are asking for renovation of their pivots, and we try to meet this need as much as we can,” Fullmer said.

“On a year when water is short, as this year has been, it’s nice to be able to use less water and still have a good crop,” he said.

Producers also found better turnaround time on hay. Typically, when farmers shut down sprinklers to cut their alfalfa — to dry the ground so they can cut and bale — and then have to refill the soil water profile so the alfalfa can start growing again, it takes several days.

“The water profile fills quicker under a LESA system than it does under a typical MESA because the water-holding capacity of the soil is already filled,” Fullmer said.

This has been successful enough that the local working group has prioritized projects that include LESAs, he said.

“It’s eye-opening when you drive through the valley on a windy day; you can see wind drift spray from the MESA systems, but our LESAs are not drifting. It’s very obvious,” Fullmer said.

Wind drift reduces irrigation efficiency.

“Efficiency for a standard MESA can bounce anywhere between 80% to 85%,” he said. “What we are seeing with the LESA is between 90% and 95%, and that difference adds up.”

LESA also can be used around cattle. Some people thought it wouldn’t work in a field with cattle, thinking the cows would damage the irrigation system.

“We’ve applied more than 100 LESA systems and haven’t had anyone complain about cattle wrecking them,” he said.

Each system is custom-fit to deal with different slopes, soil types and water quality.