Effect of water application methods on salinity leaching efficiency in different textured soils based on laboratory measurements and model simulations

Ting Yang, Setrag Cherchian, Xinmin Liu, Hossein Shahrokhnia, Minghao Mo, Jirka Šimůnek and Laosheng Wu

Agricultural Water Management, 2023, vol. 281, issue C

Abstract: Irrigated agriculture has been in a quandary of sustaining its productivity for centuries while attempting to cope with soil and water salinity issues that continue to devastate crop production. Several of the research gaps associated with current irrigation practices include how to assess leaching requirement (LR) and efficiency (LE) for different soils, crops, and irrigation regimes. The objective of this study was to test irrigation water application methods on salinity leaching efficiency using laboratory soil column experiments and computer model simulations. Three water application methods (continuous ponding, CP; intermittent ponding, IP; and unsaturated application, UA) were imposed on packed columns of 3 different soils to evaluate salinity leaching efficiency. The HYDRUS-1D model was employed to inversely estimate water and solute transport parameters from the column experimental data, while the HYDRUS-2D model was used to simulate water and salinity transport under flexible (actual field practice) and fixed frequency irrigation (every 7, 5, and 3 days) under the same field conditions. Our column results showed that water application methods had greater impact on leaching efficiency (LE) in coarse soil than that in fine soil. The soil quality (S index) also changed with water application methods. Continuous ponding had higher LE for the sandy loam and silt loam, unsaturated application was the best for the silt loam, while intermittent ponding and unsaturated application were good for both the silt loam and clay. Model simulations indicated that flexible frequency irrigation resulted in lower salinity in the rootzone than that of fixed frequency irrigation, while for the fixed frequency irrigation, more frequent application with smaller amount of water was better for the silt loam. Leaching efficiency under flexible frequency irrigation was 94.2%; while for the fixed frequency irrigation, the LE values were 87.8%, 95.4%, 98.0%, respectively, for 7-, 5-, and 3-d intervals. The findings from this research can help farmers improve water use efficiency by considering water application methods and soil conditions.

Keywords: Leaching efficiency; Irrigation methods; Rootzone; HYDRUS-1D/-2D; Agriculture water management (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:agiwat:v:281:y:2023:i:c:s0378377423001154

DOI: 10.1016/j.agwat.2023.108250

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