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THE SYNERGISTIC EFFECTS OF DRIP SYSTEM UNIFORMITY AND SOIL VARIABILITY ON DRAINAGE AND NITRATE LEACHING UNDER ARID CONDITIONS: A NUMERICAL STUDY
Author(s) -
Guan Hongjie,
Li Jiusheng,
Li Yanfeng
Publication year - 2019
Publication title -
irrigation and drainage
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.421
H-Index - 38
eISSN - 1531-0361
pISSN - 1531-0353
DOI - 10.1002/ird.2390
Subject(s) - leaching (pedology) , drainage , irrigation , nitrate , environmental science , leaching model , arid , soil water , drip irrigation , soil science , agronomy , soil salinity , chemistry , geology , ecology , paleontology , organic chemistry , biology
Both irrigation and soil heterogeneities can affect drainage and nitrate leaching. However, the interactive effect of irrigation and soil heterogeneity under different irrigation levels still remains unclear. The irrigation and soil heterogeneity effects on drainage and nitrate leaching at a typical growth stage for cotton were evaluated using the HYDRUS‐2D software. The results showed that increasing irrigation heterogeneity increased the average drainage and nitrate leaching; however, the opposite result was observed for the effect of soil heterogeneity. Both irrigation and soil heterogeneity had a negative effect on the Nemerow average drainage and nitrate leaching. The Nemerow average drainage and nitrate leaching that resulted from the combined heterogeneities were higher than those obtained when either irrigation or soil heterogeneity was considered. An increase in irrigation level increased the Nemerow average drainage and nitrate leaching. Both irrigation and soil heterogeneity had a substantial influence on the variability of drainage and nitrate leaching. Combined irrigation and soil heterogeneities resulted in a synergistic effect on the variability in nitrate leaching. An increase in irrigation level did not alleviate the negative effects of irrigation and soil heterogeneities on variability in nitrate leaching. A low drip system uniformity of 60% is not recommended because of the substantially increased risk of nitrate leaching in arid regions. © 2019 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.