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EFFICACY OF PARTIAL ROOT DRYING TECHNIQUE FOR OPTIMIZING SOYBEAN CROP PRODUCTION IN SEMI‐ARID REGIONS
Author(s) -
Sarai Tabrizi Mahdi,
Parsinejad Masoud,
Babazadeh Hossein
Publication year - 2012
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.625
Subject(s) - irrigation , arable land , environmental science , deficit irrigation , water content , arid , moisture , field capacity , surface irrigation , agronomy , agriculture , mathematics , irrigation management , geography , engineering , biology , paleontology , geotechnical engineering , archaeology , meteorology
ABSTRACT Partial root drying (PRD) has been shown to be an efficient technique that allows water savings in areas where water availability is a major concern for agricultural production. A study was designed to compare the performance of different degrees of conventional deficit irrigation and PRD techniques on soybean production. This study was conducted at the research field of the University of Tehran in Karaj, Iran, in 2008. The study consisted of four furrow irrigation treatments of full irrigation (FI) (100% soil moisture deficit compensation), conventional deficit irrigation at 50% (DI 50% ), 75% (DI 75% ) and partial root drying at 50% (PRD 50% ) soil moisture deficit compensation, with three replications. The results showed that water productivity (WP) in the PRD 50% treatment was 70.1, 61.9 and 48.3% higher than the FI, DI 75% and DI 50% treatments, respectively. Based on the economic analysis, the results showed that under limited land conditions (when arable land availability and not water is the limiting factor), the DI 75% treatment is recommended as a preferred management scheme, whereas, under unlimited land conditions, PRD 50% was more efficient. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.