Tile Drainage
With a professionally designed and installed tile drainage system, you can bring your crop management to a whole new level. Improve yields, improve your soil, and improve the environment. It's a good deal for everyone.
Benefits of Tile Drainage
Installing tile drains on your farm will bring numerous benefits. Here are some:
- Better Yields.
- Tile drainage has been proven over and over again to increase crop yields significantly. By enabling the plant root to access sufficient oxygen, roots thrive instead of becoming stunted. The result is a stronger, healthier plant, capable of higher yields and better quality.
- Earliness.
- In most years, tile drainage will help you get on the field sooner. Not only will this have a direct impact on yield, it helps spread out your workload to use your equipment more efficiently.
- Less Risk.
- Probably one of the key benefits of tile drainage is reducing your risk of a complete crop loss in the event of excess moisture. In some cases tile drainage has paid for itself in as little as one crop because of this.
- More efficient use of nitrogen.
- When soils become waterlogged, nitrogen begins to denitrify. Tile drainage will reduce or eliminate this problem be keeping the water table from rising into areas of high N concentration.
- More timely field operations.
- A tiled field will dry off sooner and allow you to get back in to perform your important work earlier. Get in to spray fungicide sooner, cultivate quicker, or bring in the crop without dropping out of sight.
- Salinity control.
- Also commonly referred to as “alkali”, these spots are a symptom of poor internal drainage. Over time tile drainage can completely cure these spots and prevent future problems.
- Better soil health.
- More oxygen in the soil increases microbial activity. Long overlooked, soil biology has a significant impact on crop growth and long term productivity.
Frequently Asked Questions:
Click on one of the questions below to find out more.
All plants require appropriate amounts of water and air in the soil to be able to grow. When excess water fills up the air spaces, we call a soil waterlogged. Tile drainage allows this excess water to drain away, resulting in oxygen for proper root growth. The water a plant uses is the water that remains in the soil, clinging to the soil particle.
Tile drainage is the practice of placing underground pipe to provide a means for water to be removed from a soil. We use corrugated polyethylene (PE) pipe for all of our installations. Years ago, concrete or clay “tiles” were used, and hence the name “tile drainage” was born. The pipe is perforated to allow water to seep in, and buried throughout the field at a precise grade to allow the water to drain out, typically into a ditch or creek. The result is that the water table is lowered to a point where roots are no longer drowning, but capillary action can still bring usable water into the root zone.
Tile drainage can only remove excess water, that is, water that takes up air space in a soil. After this water drains away, there is still water left clinging to the soil particle. This water, called “hygroscopic” water, is the only water a plant root can use. Anything more than this causes the root to drown for lack of oxygen.
We use a commercially built tile plow that is controlled by a laser or GPS. The entire system is built around accuracy of installation, which is critical for tile to work effectively. But as with all technologies, it’s the operator that makes things work. Our company is committed to using only highly qualified operators in all of our equipment. Quality and accuracy are our #1 concern with any drainage project.
Installing tile drains artificially lowers the water table, and there are some distinct environmental benefits associated with this practice. Under excess rainfall conditions, a field that is not tiled will "fill up" with water as the water table rises and comes closer to the surface. The result is that excess water ponds on top and is forced to run off. The runoff carries soil particles, nutrients, and pesticides with it. On the other hand, a field that is tiled has more room for water to infiltrate, and the soil particles filter out the nutrients or pesticides. Since the soil particles cannot enter the tile, the soil, nutrients, and pesticides stay on the field where they can be used by crops. One risk associated with tile, however, is the loss of nitrates. Since nitrates are soluble and will leach out through the tile with the water, we need to recognize this danger and manage it accordingly. Nitrate leaching is always a concern, even without tile, and so BMP's such as split rate applications are encouraged to reduce this risk.
Where do I start?
If you want to see how tile drainage can improve your crops and increase your bottom line, call us for a consultation. We will visit your farm, assess the field, and give recommendations on how tile drainage can work for you. The typical process for having tile drains installed can take a bit of time. We encourage you to think ahead and start working on it early. There are several items that need to be worked on ahead of time, and we can do this all for you. Some of these items are:
- Drainage licensing with Manitoba Water Stewardship
- Neighbour, Municipal or Conservation District permissions
- Utilities crossing agreements
- Outlet requirements such as ditch deepening, outlet pipe extensions
- Accommodating other infrastructure such as irrigation or water lines
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Contact Us
Precision Land Solutions
T: 204.325.2929
F: 204.325.8337
E: cunrau@gmail.com
32 Springfield Bay
Winkler, MB Canada
R6W 1L7