Deficit Irrigation in Peach Orchards under Water Scarcity Conditions

António Canatário Duarte,Maria Paula Simões,Abel Veloso,António Ramos,Dora Ferreira

doi:10.18502/keg.v5i6.7092

António Canatário Duarte, Maria Paula Simões + Show 3 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.18502/keg.v5i6.7092

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Abstract

The irrigation patterns in two peach orchards, located in the central eastern region of Portugal, called “Beira Interior”, and the effect of different amounts of irrigation on the total production and fruit quality were evaluated. The experiment was conducted in 2016, in two different orchards, and included three treatments correspondent to three different flow rates per tree: 8, 12 and 16 l/hour. The water balance, which included the water supplied by rain and irrigation and the crop evapotranspiration, was developed. At harvest, crop production, pulp firmness and percentage of the total soluble solids were evaluated. There were no significant differences between treatments in the average production per tree. However, in one of the orchards production increased with the volume of irrigation. In the same orchard, fruit firmness decreased with the increasing water supply. Total soluble solids had decreased with the increasing water supply in both orchards, probably as a consequence of the dilution effect due, directly, to the water incorporated in the fruits, or, indirectly, to the larger fruits produced by the trees that were irrigated more. In general, the treatments used in this study as well as in the farmers’ practices, the supplied water was in deficit, but the farmers tend empirically to follow closely the evolution of evapotranspiration. Keywords: Deficit irrigation, Peach tree, Production, Total soluble solids, Fruit firmness

Highlights

Deficit irrigation can be achieved by supplying water below the crop needs that can be represented by its evapotranspiration [1]
Considering the moment when θ equals the readily available water (RAW) limit as the indicator for the irrigation timing, the beginning of irrigation in this Trial Fields (TF) was late
Treatment T12 being the one which is closest to the farmer practice, the water provided to the crop was in a deficit amount, which might have been a limiting factor for the crop productivity

Summary

Introduction

Deficit irrigation can be achieved by supplying water below the crop needs that can be represented by its evapotranspiration [1]. The water is supplied to the plants below their needs, but with an irrigation frequency that restricts the water stress signs [3]. The Controlled Deficit Irrigation with water restrictions is only applied in the crop development phases where this deficit has the lowest impact in production and quality [4], [5]. Both of these strategies, if correctly implemented, result in improved water use, which is especially important when that resource is scarce and

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