Startup is not opening the main valve and leaving. It is bringing the system up slowly, then running every zone and watching it.
That is when the winter shows itself. A riser that cracked. A head pushed over by frost heave. A nozzle silted shut. A head throwing at the driveway instead of the lawn. A zone that is quietly two heads short of coverage.
Fixing an arc in April costs an adjustment. Finding it in July costs a brown strip that takes the rest of the short season to recover.
How the bill works
The first hour is the startup. After that, labor is hourly. A simple system that comes up clean stays inside the first hour. A system that needs heads reset, a valve diagnosed, or a zone chased is billed for that time, with parts listed on their own lines rather than folded into a per-head guess.
If the inspection turns into a repair, you hear about it before the work continues. The repair page explains how that labor is billed: sprinkler repair.
Tied to the blowout
A startup goes well when the system was emptied in the fall. A startup on a system that sat full of water is often a repair call with the water on. If last fall was missed, say so when you book. We would rather know before we charge the lines.
The blowout side of that pair is sprinkler blowouts. New coverage and controller upgrades are irrigation installation.
Absentee properties
A cabin that is empty until Memorial Day does not get a second chance at a startup week. April and May are when Fish Haven, Garden City, St. Charles, and the rest of the valley all want the same visit. Booking before you leave in the fall, or as soon as you know your first weekend, is what gets the system on the route while the turf can still use the water.
The first fertilizer step wants to land in the same stretch of weeks. It is a separate service, on the fertilizer and weed control page, and it counts toward the bundle if irrigation maintenance is also on the property.