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[zmc]

Hey,
I just started playing two days ago. This is my fourth attempt now and irrigation is driving me nuts. I was using the "Complete and Utter Newby Tutorial" but as I understand it I can no longer grow plants on plain soil, I need mud. And for a permanent plant farm I need irrigation from a river or aquifer, right?
But I can't seem to get irrigation working, how do I build that corkscrew pump I need? Do I even need that?
I've flooded a room from a river. The connection from room to river has a grate so I don't get eaten by giant fish. The room has stairs up so the water ends there. Now I need a pump on the upper floor so I can pump some water from the basin below to the upper floor without flooding it entirely. Correct so far?
I've been able to build the three parts of a pump in my carpenter's workshop, pipe section, giant corkscrew and the blocks. But what now? I tried building a mechanic's workshop but nobody came finish the construction site, am I maybe lacking someone with the right profession?
Is there any other, easier way to do this? I've never played with aquifers because the tooltip when embarking says not to. Is it maybe easier to irrigate with an aquifer?

Please help!
ZMC

[Nil Eyeglazed]

A pump's a good option.

To build a mechanic workshop and the mechanism, you need engineering/mechanics enabled.

You're doing it right so far

There's more than one way to do it.  Bust into an aquifer, use an evaporating constant floodplain, do a bucket brigade, do floodgates, plant outdoor plants, skip it all and rely on trade.  What you're doing seems like the best plan to me.

[RCIX]

I prefer to find a small pool which i can use to irrigate an umderground farm.

[Darkmere]

I usually take the easy way out and embark in a biome with lots of plants above ground, and use those seeds to make above-ground farms first. This only works if you're in a soil level, though.  If you have to use rock layers for farming quickly, it's faster to skip the pump setup and just drain a murky pool into an underground room.

Leave a small gap between your underground irrigation canal and the wall of the murky pool. Smooth the stone at the end of the hallway, and carve a fortification out of it to keep critters out (or, you can construct one if it happens to be soil/sand). Dig a 1-tile exit on the other end of the soon-to-be-farm room, and channel out a small area to hold the overflow of water. You can pump it out later or make a short-term water source if need be with whatever's left over. You can channel out the opening tile from 1 level up to keep your miner safe, and/or install floodgates if you want to keep some of the water in the pool.

~~~~~~~
~~~~~~~
XXX~XXX
XXXFXXX
XXX~XXX
======X
======X
======D
======X
======X
_XXXXXXX
VVVVVVVV
VVVVVVVV
VVVVVVVV

~ = water/irrigation canal
X = wall
F = Fortification
D access doorway (placing a door here keeps water in the room, make sure to lock it while irrigating)
_ empty floor
V channeled pit for drainage


That's the fastest way to plump helmets, no harvesting or extra processing involved.

[Xenos]

when i irrigate i will dig a room on the same z level as a river/brook and have a tunnel leading to it with a lever controlled floodgate in it.  when i need to irrigate i simply pull the lever, flood the room, pull the lever to stop the flow then allow for evaporation.  you *can* use a pump but that is more complicated (and probably more dwarfy) but i like my gravity fed method

[win32anon]

The easiest way, no pump needed is:

Dig a room lets say 10x15 close to your water source(if it's a river, ocean, aquifer or brook you'll need a next step). After you've just finished digging the room, dig the last piece(the ones that connects your room with the water), wait it to fill and evaporate.
It's better to calculate the amount of water in the source and make a room with the same titles for it, so you don't have to wait too long until it evaporates. Let's say you have a small body of water with 25 tiles, 7/7 water in every, you have 175 water tiles to fill, minus the 25 tiles of the source, it's 150, you can fill your room without waiting any longer...It may take some extra water if you are in a Hot/Scorching climate zone.

If your water source has unlimited water(rivers, brooks.....) you'll need a door linked to a lever. Build 3 mechanism in the Mechanics Workshop(b>w>t), then build a lever(b>T>l), when your done building the lever, press 'q' and select the lever, press 'a' to link and 'd' to link to the door.(use +/- to scroll between doors)
Open the door with the lever, dig the last piece wait the flow fill half of the room, order a dwarf to Pull the Lever.

Good luck!

Ps: avoid making those creepy underground farms connected to your fort...it might cause you a lot of fun.

[culwin]

First, just in case you didn't know, this should be your most important link (use the 2010 pages mainly):
http://df.magmawiki.com/index.php/Main_Page

There are two types of plants - above ground and underground.
You typically embark with seeds for underground ones, but you can get above-ground ones by harvesting random bushes if they grow naturally where you are, or from trading.
In either case, they can only be planted in soil (sand counts as soil; rock/stone do not).
The underground ones have to be planted in mud - this requires your soil to have been wet.  So typically people will somehow get some water onto those soil tiles, and then let it evaporate (there are 7 depth levels to water, but you want to stop adding water at level 1 so it evaporates).
Pumps are one way (see the wiki on how to build a pump STACK) - pumps themselves are BUILDINGS so you don't need a mechanic or a mechanic's workshop for them.
If you have the components, then you set a place for the pump in the build ('b') menu.  Then you need an architect, who will come and do some building-designer stuff, and then you need a carpenter/metalsmith/mason, depending on what materials the pump is made from, who will finish the job.
But it may be easier to just path water to your farm (like from a river or pool), build a door with a lever in between, and then close the door with the lever when there's enough water to make the mud.  It's usually quicker than pumps although it could expose your fortress to the outside and other things.

[zmc]

To build a mechanic workshop and the mechanism, you need engineering/mechanics enabled.

There's more than one way to do it.  Bust into an aquifer, use an evaporating constant floodplain, do a bucket brigade, do floodgates, plant outdoor plants, skip it all and rely on trade.  What you're doing seems like the best plan to me.

I'll check out if engineering/mechanics is locked when I get home... I have a feeling there might be no dwarf with the mechanics skill though... Might have to start over. -- Since I have a basin full of water in the immediate vicinity of where I want the farm, how does "bucket brigade" work? It sounds very doable given the situation.

I prefer to find a small pool which i can use to irrigate an umderground farm.

But that dries out, doesn't it? Or am I doing this wrong, last time I simply "punctured" the pond underground and obviously that results in a lot of water initially but then thats it.



Wow, thank's for all the input, guys! I'm gonna try all of this when I get home. Surface Plants sound great, I've already collected a lot of herbs so I might actually have some already. Also, the door-controlled irrigation seems simple enough for me to grasp the concept, so I'll give that a shot initially.
Murky pools etc. I don't really like, its not sustainable if I understand it correctly. I need a "permanent solution" :-)

[win32anon]

You only need to mud the soil once, after that... Armok will take care of everything

[Lytha]

You do  not need a pump for your farming plot, at least not necessarily so. You need 3 mechanisms, 1 door or 1 floodgate, and that's it.

1. Find the water source.
2. Dig out your intended farming plot close to your water source, but leave a bit of space in between these two. Two tile of space are enough.
3. Dig a 1 tile wide opening into the wall between your farming plot and the wet water wielding tile.
4. Install your door or floodgate.
5. Put a lever somewhere else and connect it to the door or floodgate.
6. Now go up one z-level and channel out the wet tile that's between your door/floodgate and the water source.
7. Open the door/floodgate for a minute or less. Take care not to flood it at more than water level height 1-2, else it'll take a while to dry up.
8. If you flooded the room too badly, just send in your miner and let him dig out some rooms next to the farming plot so that  the water can spread out more and dry up much faster.


I personally opt for the aquifer option, but you can do just the same with a murky pool or with a river/brook - even though I'd be wary of carp or other stuff with rivers or cavernous water sources. With rivers and cavernous water sources, I would install a wall with a fortification, a grate and then the floodgate/door. This should keep out the bad stuff.

[Darkmere]

You can enable any labor on any dwarf at any time. Go to the map population list [ u ] select Urist McRandom, [ c ] to zoom to subject, [ p ]ref, [ l ]abor, mechanic is under engineering.

[zmc]

You only need to mud the soil once, after that... Armok will take care of everything

Oh dear. I hadn't realized that. That makes it so much more simple! Then I really just have to puncture a murky pool.

[Nil Eyeglazed]

Mud doesn't disappear easily, but it can disappear.

[zmc]

I read somewhere it would disappear if you built a road over it. But as long as I keep my helmet plump farm on top of it it would stay, wouldn't it?

[Lytha]

I think that the mud might "disappear" if a dwarf has the splendid idea to clean up your fortress, for a change. My dwarves never clean up the place, but I think that they might do it if you happen to smooth the rock below your farming plot.