How do I edit duration and frequency on Flex Daily Schedules?

Last Update:Apr 18 2024 4:53pm • Est. Read Time:Est. Read Time: 6 MIN

Summary

Want to make a quick edit to watering durations? Do you think your schedules are watering too much? Flex Daily schedules automatically select durations for your zones based on the attributes that have been selected. To edit the durations recommended, go to the Schedules tab, select the schedule you want to edit, and select Watering Duration.

After clicking on Watering Durations, you can edit the durations in minute-by-minute increments. These adjustments can be made to any, some, or all zones.



How can I adjust Flex Daily Schedules?

The following explains how each zone attribute affects the duration and interval of a zone, and which Advanced Zone Settings they may be correlated with:


Basic Zone Settings:

Before we dive into the advanced zone settings first we need to look at the basic zone setting as these settings when changed can also affect the values on the advanced settings, here we have a list of the basic zone settings and how each of them correlates with the advanced zone settings and how it affects the schedules:

Vegetation Type

The vegetation type is used to help determine watering durations. Each vegetation or plant type has a different crop coefficient, which is used in determining evapotranspiration. The higher the coefficient number, the more water the plant uses.

  • Vegetation Type= Root Depth + Crop Coefficient
    • Affects both watering duration and watering frequency

Spray Head

Choosing the correct spray head (or accurately customizing the precipitation rate in your zone's advanced settings) is one of the most important factors in determining a zone run time. Nozzle precipitation in/hr is one of the factors used in calculating watering duration. A higher precipitation rate will lower the overall run time and vice versa. To learn more about precipitation rates, please see this support article.

Nozzle type can be modified from Zone settings.

Spray Head= Efficiency + Nozzle Inches Per Hour

  • Affects watering duration

Soil Type

Understanding your lawn's general soil type is helpful when creating watering schedules to minimize runoff. Additionally, estimating the depth of the roots helps to understand the size of the soil moisture reservoir (or the "water tank" in which the Rachio controller can refill). Each zone can have a different-sized water tank based on the soil in that zone and what's growing in the zone.

The earth’s soil serves as water storage for vegetation. If you think of this storage as being similar to a sponge, it helps illustrate why soil type is an important factor in Rachio’s scheduling decisions, in particular, Flex Daily and Smart Cycle features. 

 

  • Soil Type= Available Water [Capacity] (AWC)
    • Affects both watering duration and watering frequency

Exposure

Sun exposure is used as a ratio of crop coefficient, which is used as a ratio of ET. When a zone receives less sun, this will decrease its overall ET value, which will in turn decrease watering frequency.

Sun exposure can be modified in the Zone settings.


  • Exposure= no advanced settings correlation
    • More sun exposure increases the watering frequency
    • Less sun exposure reduces the watering frequency

Slope

Slope affects the maximum allowable zone run-time within Smart Cycle. As the slope gets steeper, the maximum allowed watering time decreases (as illustrated in this support article). For steep terrain, a runoff will occur at a much faster rate. 


  • Slope= no advanced settings correlation
    • Increasing the slope extends the soak time
    • Decreasing the slope reduces soak time

Now that we have seen what the basic settings are let's move on to the advanced settings to understand how this affects the Flex Daily schedule directly.


Advanced Zone Settings:

 Zone Attribute  Run time  Frequency 
Area 
  • Used to perform Usage calculations only.

  • Used to perform Usage calculations only.
Available Water
  • Increasing extends run time
  • Decreasing reduces run time
  • Increasing reduces watering frequency
  • Decreasing increases watering frequency
Root Depth
  • Increasing extends run time
  • Decreasing reduces run time
  • Increasing reduces watering frequency
  • Decreasing increases watering frequency
Allowed Depletion
  • Increasing the % increases run time
  • Decreasing the % reduces run time
  • Increasing the % decreases the watering frequency
  • Decreasing the % increases the watering frequency
Efficiency
  • Increasing reduces run time
  • Decreasing extends run time



Crop coefficient


  • Increasing crop coefficient increases the watering frequency
  • Decreasing crop coefficient decreases the watering frequency

        Nozzle Inches          Per Hour

  • Increasing reduces run time
  • Decreasing extends run time


 

Available Water (AWC)

Soil type affects the available water capacity (AWC). AWC is the amount of water that a soil can store that is available for use by plants.

We have chosen industry-standard AWC default values:

Sand0.05
Loamy Sand0.07
Sandy Loam0.12
Loam0.15
Clay Loam0.16
Silty Clay0.17
Clay0.20


Increasing AWC will increase the irrigation amount needed, increasing the run time but decreasing the watering frequency. The opposite also applies. Decreasing AWC will decrease the irrigation amount needed, which will decrease the run time but increase the watering frequency.

AWC can be modified from Zones Screen>Edit> Advanced Settings > AVAILABLE WATER

Root Depth (RZD)

Each crop has a default root zone depth (RZD) as well as a crop coefficient. RZD is used to calculate the amount of irrigation applied, which affects the run time. The longer the roots, the greater the irrigation amount, and the greater the run time.

We have chosen industry-standard RZD default values:

Crop Type
Inch.
Cool Season Grass6
Warm Season Grass9
Shrubs15
Trees25
Flower Beds10
Desert Adapted5
Vegetable Garden4


As you can see for crops like trees and shrubs with much deeper roots, the watering duration will be longer, but the frequency of watering will be much less. Increasing RZD will increase the irrigation amount needed, increasing the run time but decreasing the watering frequency. The opposite also applies. Decreasing RZD will decrease the irrigation amount needed, which will decrease the run time but increase the watering frequency.

RZD can be modified by going to the "Zones" tab, selecting the zone you want to edit, choosing Advanced, and scrolling to Root Depth.

Allowed Depletion (MAD)

This value, expressed in percent, is the portion of water in the root zone that plants can utilize before experiencing stress. At some point (just after the management allowed depletion level), the plant becomes stressed. As the soils become even drier, the plant will eventually reach its permanent wilting point. We default to 50% MAD for each zone. Increasing the MAD percentage will decrease the irrigation amount needed, which will decrease the run time but increase the watering frequency. The opposite also applies. Decreasing the MAD percentage will increase the irrigation amount needed, increasing the run time but decreasing the watering frequency.

MAD can be modified by going to the Zones tab, selecting the zone you want to edit, choosing Advanced, and scrolling to Allowed Depletion. 

Efficiency (DU)

Efficiency, also referred to as Application Efficiency or Distribution Uniformity (DU), tells us how efficiently the water is being distributed by the sprinklers. The lower the DU, the higher the run time needs to be to deliver enough water to the area with the weakest coverage.

  • DU is a factor used to adjust the run time to account for non-uniform distribution of irrigation water
  • DU can be measured by conducting a catch-cup test.  

 

If the E/DU is below 0.40, then time and effort should be spent identifying what needs to be done to ensure the system is operating optimally. This may include recommendations for improving maintenance or to seek the services of a certified Water Manager to identify the factors that are causing such poor performance. When the uniformity is low, it is hard to justify the amount of additional water needed to minimize stressed areas and achieve an acceptable appearance. When additional minutes of run time become excessive, runoff potential increases and it becomes more difficult to do proper maintenance if the sprinkler system is operating beyond its desired or designated water window.



Crop Coefficient

Crop Coefficient is the best setting for adjusting watering frequency.  Each crop type has a coefficient.  Crop coefficients are properties of plants used in predicting evapotranspiration (ET). The coefficient is the ratio of ET observed for the crop. If ET is our zone checkbook debit, the crop coefficient will offset ET slightly and not remove as much from our account. 

Example: ET for the day is .2 inches. The crop coefficient for cool-season grass is  80%. The debit for the day is .16 inches (.2 x .80).

Increasing crop coefficient increases watering frequency, and decreasing crop coefficient decreases watering frequency.

Recommend moving the crop coefficient slider +/- 10% increments and see if that gets watering to the correct cadence. Crop coefficient can be modified from Zone Menu > Advanced Settings > Crop Coefficient.

Crop Type
Inch.
Cool Season Grass0.80
Warm Season Grass0.65
Shrubs0.50
Trees0.75
Flower Beds0.55
Desert Adapted0.30
Vegetable Garden0.85


Nozzle Inches Per Hour

This is a measurement of how much water your sprinklers are applying to your zone. This rate is expressed in inches per hour, so is directly comparable to natural rain and evapotranspiration. Rachio has set up your zone with a default rate based on manufacturers' averages for the type of sprinkler head you selected for the zone.



Real-time Flex Schedule Manipulation

One of the great things about Flex Schedules is that they are flexible. Feel free to modify zone settings and go back to the calendar view or flex schedule to dynamically see run times and/or frequency changes as you modify characteristics.


Further Reading

If you need more and are hungry for the science behind this, a lot of the concepts we've used are from the article Irrigation Scheduling: The Water Balance Approach


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