Safflower model for simulation of growth and yield under various irrigation strategies, planting methods and nitrogen fertilization

Document Type : Research Paper

Authors

1 Irrigation Department, Shiraz University, Iran.

2 Irrigation Department, Shiraz University, Shiraz, I.R. of Iran

Abstract

Development and use of crop growth models is an effective tool for agricultural planning
and decision making in agricultural industry. Besides, the drought and limited supplies of water
in many areas of the world has increased attention to favourable strategies in farm management
such as efficient irrigation and planting methods. The objective of this study was to develop a
crop model for safflower known as a multi-purpose crop under various irrigation regimes,
planting methods and nitrogen fertilization. The experiment was designed as split-split plot that
arranged in randomized complete blocks with irrigation strategy as the main plot, planting
method as the subplot and nitrogen levels as the sub-subplot in three replications. The irrigation
strategies consisted of ordinary furrow irrigation (OFI) and variable alternate furrow irrigation
(VAFI) as a partial root drying (PRD) technique. The planting methods were on-ridge planting
(P1) and in-furrow planting (P2) methods. The fertilizer levels were 0 (N0), 100 (N1) and
200 (N2) kg ha-1 of urea as 0, 46 and 92 kg N ha-1. Two years of the experiment carried out in a
semi-arid area from 2012 to 2014. The field data of the second year of experiment were used to
develop the model and it was validated by the data of first year. The results indicated that the
proposed safflower model is able to estimate evapotranspiration, soil water content, leaf area
index, soil surface evaporation, crop transpiration, biomass, straw and seed yield of safflower in
an appropriate manner. The safflower model is useful for having better field management and
reducing administrative costs with respect to the model simplicity and its briefness in data input.

Keywords

International Journal of Plant Production
Volume 11, Issue 1 - Serial Number 1
January 2017
Pages 167-192

Files

Share

How to cite

Statistics