Fort Stockton School District
Fort Stockton, Texas

The rugged wilderness of the Chihuahuan Desert surrounds the historic city of Fort Stockton. Brown-rock mesas and wide-open spaces characterize this West Texas city established as an early military outpost in 1859. Today, Fort Stockton thrives as the Pecos County seat, where approximately two-thirds of the county's 15,000 residents live and work and attend school. Every day from September to June, 3,000 children arrive at the Fort Stockton School District's seven campuses, some traveling from 40 miles across the county's wide expanse.

Most of the district's schools are at least forty years old and, until the fall of 1996, all of them had manually irrigated grounds. Everyday, cannons on the school district's baseball and football fields blasted water for hours, while janitors continuously moved portable sprinklers on lawns and playgrounds. Water use on one football field in July 1996, when temperatures in Pecos County typically simmer in the hundreds, was metered at 1,373,000 gallons at a cost of $1,800.

Despite the effort expended and amount of water consumed, it was impossible to irrigate an entire campus in one day and stubborn dry spots marred the fields and lawns ... until the district decided it had had enough.

In 1996, the school district hired Jean-Michel Duforat, a licensed irrigator and owner of West Texas Irrigation, to design and install an automatic irrigation system. With the goals of beautifying campus grounds, conserving water and saving money, the first phase of a 60-acre renovation was undertaken and completed in October 1996, costing $251,000. Approximately 30 acres received Rain Bird automatic sprinkler systems featuring the Falcon and R-50 rotors. Falcon rotors delivered even coverage to green up Fort Stockton School District's sports fields.

In July 1997, water use on the same football field was metered at 347,000 gallons. The new Rain Bird automatic system resulted in a 75 percent reduction in water use. The cost for that month was $471; part of the cost reduction was also due to a switch to well water. "We decided the only way to go was with an automatic system," said Dale Pitts, district superintendent. "It saves us money, personnel time and the turf is looking extremely good. And, we have plans of improving other areas that are not automatically irrigated."

Falcon rotors delivered even coverage to green up
Fort Stockton School District's sports fields.

Falcon, R-50s Get A+ for Performance

The Falcon rotor is an ideal performer on schools, sports fields, parks, and other large-turf areas. With advanced Rain Curtain® nozzle technology, the Falcon delivers a "curtain" of large water droplets for unequaled, uniform distribution. The Falcon with a stainless steel riser, called Silver Falcon, also deters vandalism.

The R-50 rotor is a heavy-duty closed-case rotor for light commercial and residential applications. It has two nozzle families: the Rain Curtain nozzles for superior close-in watering and Radius+ nozzles for maximum radius. The R-50 has a full- or part-circle capability in one unit and an easy arc adjustment. It also has a vandal-resistant, stainless steel locking set screw at cap threads.

Wide Variety of Equipment Used

• Falcon rotors apply uniform amounts of water on the district's sports fields (quantity 480).
• R-50 rotors efficiently irrigate the smaller areas of turf in the front of the schools (quantity 320).
• 1800 Series spray heads, MPR and VAN nozzles are great for irregularly shaped lawns (quantity 810 sprayheads).
• 1401 pressure compensating bubblers keep uniformity high on shrub and flower beds (quantity 120).
• PGA 2" electric remote-control valves have a non-rising flow control handle to adjust flow as needed (quantity 143).
• ESP-LX controllers with 8, 12 and 16 stations and four independent programs for scheduling flexibility (quantity 12)

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