I live in Zone 8, Kirkland WA and built a house a year ago. The builder installed a Rainbird spray head sprinkler system. We had a basic planting set-up for a new house -- a simple bed all around the perimeter with a few native shrubs (some hydrangeas, azaleas, rhododendron, etc.). It was a hot summer and I had fresh sod and new plants so I watered frequently. My first water bill gave me quite a shock, so I made plans to convert my planting beds to a drip irrigation system using Rainbird's spray to drip conversion system.

Fast forward to this summer and after about $300 in parts and some seriously back-breaking work over several weekends my drip system was installed. Excellent! I also planted about 75 new perennials and shrubs (small guys) to start to fill in the beds, with plans to add many more this fall. All hooked up with drip emitters, growing and happy. Life is good.

And now I'm thinking about pulling out the whole drip system and going back to spray heads. Here's why:

• Running emitters sucks. This is really the biggest issue for me. I want lush landscaping (think Pacific Northwest woodland garden like this) so I still want to plant another 25 or so young, native shrubs, trees, grasses in my beds just this fall. I've learned it's really a pain in the butt to have to run yet another drip line, check it for leaks, bury it, etc. This is not a concern with the spray heads which just cover the whole area regardless the number of plants I throw at it.
• It's more maintenance. Instead of 20 points of failure (spray heads) I have more like 100 if you include all the converters, connections, emitters, etc. I've already had to repair leaks and replace many heads.
• With all those emitter lines running throughout the beds it's really hard to mulch and weed and lay down compost without constantly tripping over the lines.
• Yes, my water bill was down, but the weather was much cooler, we had more rain and more of my plants are established, requiring less water. So, over time the use of the spray heads (in the planting beds at least) will be less and less, and really only to supplement on really hot days if I choose my plants wisely.
• I've read that a drip system can sometimes cause problems because as the roots reach out further if the drip doesn't also reach out with it it will limit proper root growth.
• Can I even winterize a drip system?
• This is more of a preferential thing, but I also notice with the drip system that by mid-summer my garden beds were so dusty compared to running the spray heads, which must keep dust down. A day of weeding (and yes, still had plenty of weeds) leaves me looking like a coal miner.

I saved all my spray heads so converting back shouldn't be too hard. But it does seem crazy. I already did all the hard work. Should I just stick it out? Am I the only person to ever think this? Am I nuts?