Buck notes that although
their father, Ricky Moore,
put in the first pivot in 1994,
it wasn’t until the mid-2000s
that they became more
aggressive about adding ad-
ditional units.
Now that the farm’s fifth
generation has assumed a
management role (their fa-
ther still farms and operates
under Moore Farms), pivot
installations have occurred at
an even faster pace.
benefits outweigh
loss of crop
“W
e put in three new
pivots this past year
and eight the year before
that. We basically put up as
many as we can afford to
each year. They make it so
much easier to grow water-
melons. Plus, it gives us the
ability to irrigate other crops
in following years,” Broc
adds, noting that they grow
about 220 acres of watermel-
ons and about 200 acres of
corn, with the balance being
in their other main crops.
“The benefits we gain with
SWAPPING DRIP FOR PIVOTS
ONE ADVANTAGE OF DOING SO IS THE ABILITY
TO REMOTELY CONTROL IRRIGATION.
F
or several years, the partners in Southern Acres Farms
grew watermelons just like every other melon producer
located around Lenox, Georgia. That meant burying
drip tape approximately 4 to 6 inches deep throughout
the field and attaching it to a network of supply hoses
and filters. As always, at the end of the season, the partners
would plow up and then dispose of that drip tape after only
one season of use.
“It amounted to a lot of expense, even though the filters
and flex hoses can be used from year to year,” points out
Buck Moore, who farms with his brother, Broc Moore, and
his brother-in-law, Tyler Sumner. “The drip tape alone runs
about $150 per acre. By the time we add labor and fuel to
install it and dig it up after harvest, we’re looking at $200 to
$300 per acre.”
converting to pivots to cut costs
C
onsequently, the Southern Acres team has been steadily
converting to pivot irrigation on the majority of the 3,000
acres. In addition to investing in a system that is more perma-
nent, the pivots can also be used when the fields are rotated
into the other crops produced on the farm, which include cot-
ton, peanuts, corn, and tobacco.
“The drip was only used in fields where we grew watermel-
ons,” Buck says. “However, irrigation can provide a benefit
with any of the crops, including peanuts and tobacco, particu-
larly in a dry year.”
Photography: Tharran Gaines
center pivot units far out-
weigh anything we lose with
pivot wheels running over
watermelons or vines.”
The biggest challenge,
says Tyler, is budgeting the
cost of pivots on their small
fields, which average around
28 to 30 acres each. “This is
an expensive area to put up
pivots, just because of the
field size,” Tyler admits.
“Still, the only reason we
would continue to use drip
tape is if a field is so irregu-
lar in size that we can’t cover
it with a full pivot or wiper.”
This past year, the part-
ners also discovered another
pivot benefit that came
with the addition of remote
control and monitoring
via AgSense to the three
newest units.
remote control
“T
he pivots are not that
far from the office,”
Buck admits. “So, it’s not
a matter of having to drive
very far to check on them or
start and stop a unit. What
we did find, though, is that
when we’re spraying a crop,
we can just use the cell
phone to move the pivot out
of the way without having
to stop or get off the sprayer.
With the exception of corn,
we do have to spray every-
thing multiple times.”
Hence, once pivots have
replaced drip lines wherever
it’s feasible, the final step for
Southern Acres will
probably be to retrofit
several of the 45 to 50 pivots
on the farm for remote
management. In the
meantime, the partners can
look forward to throwing
fewer dollars away each
year in the form of
disposable plastic.
Bonus Successful Farming at Agriculture.com |August 2019
The Southern Acres Farms team
comprises (from left) Broc Moore, Tyler
Sumner, and Buck Moore.
i r r i g a t i o n INSIDER
By Tharran Gaines
