Get to know the IA Board: Inge Bisconer

In this series introducing readers to the Irrigation Association’s board members, get to know Inge Bisconer, CID, CLIA, vice president of the IA board and managing member of Surf’N Earth Enterprises LLC in Cardiff, California.

How did you get involved with the irrigation industry?

After graduating with a B.S. in general agriculture from the University of California, Davis in 1981, I took a job as an orchard technologist for a big corporate farming operation in Bakersfield, California, where I scheduled irrigation and fertigation on 13,000 acres of drip and sprinkler irrigated permanent crops. We were also installing about a thousand acres of drip/micro/sprinkler irrigation each year on various vineyard and orchard crops, so I learned about “modern” pressurized irrigation quickly and worked with many of the leading, early global irrigation equipment manufacturers and prominent San Joaquin Valley irrigation dealers in the process.

As background, I grew up with irrigated agriculture on my family’s cotton/diversified farming operation in Tulare and worked there as a siphon pipe irrigator during summers in college, but never dreamed “irrigation” would become my career — I had always planned to go back to manage the family farm. But a job offer from one of the irrigation manufacturers to help other farmers adopt drip led to a transfer to its headquarters in San Diego County, which has been home since.

That initial position led to many others in both the ag and landscape parts of the industry including technical, marketing, sales and management, with both drip and sprinkler technologies. Now, I’m semi-retired, have my own consulting firm and am honored to be vice president of the Irrigation Association. It has been a great ride!

Why is smart irrigation important to you?

I’ve said for years that I fell in love with “drip” because I had personal experience being a siphon pipe irrigator, a physically demanding job that, in retrospect, didn’t use our precious water resources as well as the pressurized irrigation technology I learned about after joining the industry. Drip irrigation didn’t require ditches and furrows and heavy pipe; rather, it could apply water directly to the crop’s root zone precisely and without waste. And sprinkler irrigation could apply water evenly over broad acres with a flip of the pump switch. And a combination of the two could efficiently irrigate sophisticated urban landscapes.

Now, these technologies can be monitored, managed and controlled using a tsunami of new technology on the market that enables farmers to optimize production, minimize the use of scarce resources and avoid harmful environmental impacts.

Growing up in the San Joaquin Valley in the shadow of the majestic Sierra Nevada mountain range, I developed a deep love for nature early on, and am proud to consider myself an environmentalist as well as a farmer and urbanite. Smart, efficient use of water and the associated energy, fertilizer, labor, etc. that go along with it in irrigated agriculture and landscapes is good for the industry, good for people and good for the planet.

What’s the most important thing an irrigation professional needs to know to be good at what they do?

I think today’s professionals need to have a deep understanding of the application of the technology to be successful. What I mean by this is that they need to know the end user, whether it’s a farmer, landscaper or homeowner, and be willing to walk in their shoes before they try to sell them something. In many ways, this is a “scrappy” business because, by definition, irrigation is the application of water to soil, and water and soil create mud!

Today’s professionals, whether they are the CEO or an entry level technician, should be comfortable outdoors in the environment where this technology is used, and at least have a genuine interest in, if not a love for, growing plants.  Otherwise, it’s just boxes of parts and containers of plastic in and out the door, numbers on a spreadsheet and annual reports. If you look at the history of the industry, the pillars are folks who had this passion.

In short, I think the most important thing a professional needs to know is whether they can have passion for the art and science of irrigation, and respect for those who irrigate. If the answer is yes, and they are willing to work hard, this industry is a fantastic choice and the sky is the limit on how far it can take them.