I share a well with my neighbor and they keep telling me that the well short cycles whenever I am runnibg my drip irrigation system in my garden and landscaped areas. I would like to know if a drip system could affect the well pump in this way or is the drip system exposing some weakness in the well system controls or design? The pump was replaced about 5 years ago and the pressure tank was replaced about 1.5 years ago. The well is 460 ft. deep and is over 25 years old.

Try running a faucet with the drip system off. Watch the pressure gauge. What you should see is a SLOW (a minute or two or more) drop in pressure to the cut in point for the pump. With water still running, you should then see a SLOW rise (perhaps several minutes) in pressure to the cut off point.

If that works OK, then try the same thing with the drip system and a faucet on. If the pressure changes become considerably more dramatic, then I would suspect either a leak in a line to the drip system, or your drip system is using a good bit higher volume than you might think.

Your pressure tank is not old, so that should be OK. How large is it?