I have absolutely no experience with irrigation other than turning on the outdoor spigot and using a hose ;)

We have an irrigation ditch running through our property (with water rights of course), The previous owner of this property has a setup that I don't understand at all (not surprising, I can't seem to grasp any information related to pumps, irrigation, etc....feel free to talk to me like I'm 5).

Here is a picture of where the pump attaches (there should be a piece of vertical PVC that actually attaches to the pump, husband accidentally hit it with a trimmer & broke it). That pipe goes out a little to a Y, going to that pipe above ground on the left and on the right about 100' to the ditch. It comes out the side of the ditch, there's no screen (right now its capped off). It comes out above the water level in the ditch (water can be extremely shallow to begin with).

http://s7.postimg.org/oim2yckpn/P3171672.jpg

Any ideas on how this is supposed to work? I understand the line to the ditch and attaching to the pump of course, but I don't know what the pipe above ground is for. The pump the previous owner left behind is a Goulds GT10.

I was thinking about getting a suction screen like this, but I'm not really sure what I'm doing. I'm willing to scrap this setup all together and just go with something like this because its all figured out for me :)

I'm sure I'll have more questions about the discharge side of irrigation, but I want to get this figured out first.

This forum is such a great place, I really appreciate any input :)