Abstract

Background

Climate change and increasing demand in non-agricultural sectors profoundly affect the availability and quality of water resources for irrigated agriculture. The FAO AquaCrop simulation model provides a sound theoretical framework to investigate crop yield response to environmental stress. This model has successfully simulated crop growth and yield as influenced by varying soil moisture environments for crops. Integrating crop models that simulate the effects of water on crop yield with targeted experimentation can facilitate the development of irrigation strategies for high yield procurement and improving farm level water management and water use efficiency (WUE) under climatic condition of District Hyderabad, Sindh, Pakistan.

Results

This study was based on completely randomized block design with three treatments including T1 (30% soil moisture depletion), T2 (50% soil moisture depletion) and T3 (70% soil moisture depletion) with three replicates. In order to determine the crop water requirements under desired treatments, the gypsum blocks were used for computing the daily soil moisture depletion. The result shows that total volume of water applied to crop under T1, T2 and T3 was 9689, 5200 and 2045 m3 ha−1, respectively. As a result, the grain yield under T1, T2 and T3 was 13.2, 12.1 and 14.3 t ha−1, respectively. These results advocate that total yield of crop under T1 and T2 was less as compared to T3. The T3 gave higher yield and WUE compared than other treatments. On the other hand, results revealed that the simulated sunflower yields showed a good agreement with their measured under T3. The simulated grain yield was 15.5 t ha−1, while the measured yield varied from 12.1 to 14.3 t ha−1. This study suggested that WUE under T3 was more as compared to T1 and T2. The results showed that the T3 gave the highest crop yield in relation to WUE and optimize yield of sunflower crop under water scarcity.

Conclusion

The Aquacrop model could very well predict crop yield and WUE at T3 under experiential region for sunflower production.

Details

Title
Effect of different soil moisture regimes on plant growth and water use efficiency of Sunflower: experimental study and modeling
Author
Soothar, Rajesh Kumar 1 ; Singha Ashutus 2   VIAFID ORCID Logo  ; Soomro, Shakeel Ahmed 3 ; Azhar-u-ddin, Chachar 3 ; Kalhoro Faiza 3 ; Rahaman, Md Arifur 4 

1  Sindh Agriculture University, Faculty of Agricultural Engineering, Tandojam, Pakistan (GRID:grid.442840.e) (ISNI:0000 0004 0609 4810); Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Beijing, China (GRID:grid.410727.7) (ISNI:0000 0001 0526 1937) 
2  Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Beijing, China (GRID:grid.410727.7) (ISNI:0000 0001 0526 1937); Sylhet Agricultural University, Faculty of Agricultural Engineering and Technology, Sylhet, Bangladesh (GRID:grid.449569.3) (ISNI:0000 0004 4664 8128) 
3  Sindh Agriculture University, Faculty of Agricultural Engineering, Tandojam, Pakistan (GRID:grid.442840.e) (ISNI:0000 0004 0609 4810) 
4  Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Beijing, China (GRID:grid.410727.7) (ISNI:0000 0001 0526 1937) 
Publication year
2021
Publication date
Dec 2021
Publisher
Springer Nature B.V.
e-ISSN
2522-8307
Source type
Scholarly Journal
Language of publication
English
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1186/s42269-021-00580-4
ProQuest document ID
2546790110
Copyright
© The Author(s) 2021. This work is published under http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (the “License”). Notwithstanding the ProQuest Terms and Conditions, you may use this content in accordance with the terms of the License.