Polymer and deficit irrigation influence on water use efficiency and yield of muskmelon under surface and subsurface drip irrigation

Abstract

Water scarcity is a major constraint facing vegetable production sustainability in open field farming of arid regions like the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. This study was carried out in an open field of the Research and Training Station of King Faisal University in the eastern region of the Kingdom. The objective was to assess the influences of the polymer addition (PA), deficit irrigation regime (DIR), and their combination on the production and water use efficiency (WUE) of muskmelons. PA treatments of 0.0, 0.2 and 0.4% and the irrigation treatments of 100, 75 and 50% of reference evapotranspiration (ET<sub>o</sub>), were imposed throughout the growth stages of muskmelons under surface drip irrigation (DI) and subsurface drip irrigation (SDI). The polymer addition of 0.4% enhanced the field water holding capacity of the medium sandy soil within the locality of the emitters by 43.6%. The soil water content of the surface layer within the vicinity of the polymer amended soil layer increased in a range of 72.4 to 99.4% to the combined influences of the 0.4% PA with the DI and SDI, but were marked more under the SDI. The combination of the 100% ET<sub>o</sub> DIR with polymer additions significantly (P < 0.05) enhanced the muskmelon fruit yield (MFY) under the SDI compared to DI. The PA of 0.4% improved WUE and MFY by 67.7, 70.4% under the SDI, and 58.6, 24.2% under the DI, respectively. Without the polymer addition (0.0% PA), the MFY significantly (P < 0.05) decreased with the increase of the DIRs under both DI and SDI.

Effect of Surface Drip Irrigation and Polymer Addition on Some Physical Soil Characteristics, Growth and Yield Characteristics of Cauliflower

“…The polymer addition results showed in the above table that there were significant differences in the mean values of the total yield, as it reached 34,17 tons hectare -1 for the treatment of adding 0,6% polymer compared to 32,08 and 30,17 tons hectare -1 for the treatments of adding 0,3% polymer and without polymer addition respectively, this is due to the decrease in the apparent density, the increase in porosity, the improvement of the stability of the aggregates, and the increase in the ability of the soil to conserve water, and these results consistent with [29],…”

Effects of Water-Fertilizer-Air-Coupling Drip Irrigation on Soil Health Status: Soil Aeration, Enzyme Activities and Microbial Biomass

“…The CR values of EA, MB and SA were 0.902, 0.941 and 0.953, respectively, and their absolute values were all >0.7, indicating that the data used were highly reliable. Cronbach's Alpha (CA) values of EA, MB and SA were 0.842, 0.907 and 0.927, respectively, and their absolute values were all >0.7 [33], which indicated that they had a high convergence validity. Average variance extracted (AVE) of the four latent variables were all >0.5 [34], and the square root value of each AVE on the diagonal was greater than the correlation of the correlation dimension (Table 2).…”

Application of Chitosan-Based Hydrogel Obtained from Insects in Pine Planting

“…Plants require a constant supply of water and mineral fertiliser application in order to function normally. Synthetic hydrogels capable of absorbing a large volume of water and then gradually releasing it are currently used to solve water supply problems in arid regions [ 1 , 2 ]. As a result, it is necessary to create a hydrogel capable of decomposing under natural conditions without the formation of harmful substances, and chitosan is one such compound.…”