Since its widespread adoption in the 1970s, drip irrigation has continued to expand steadily worldwide. There are many reasons explaining this continuous growth, but among them is its theoretical application efficiency, which is around 90
This study investigated the low water–nitrogen use efficiencies and environmental pollution caused by excessive nitrogen (N) fertilizer application during summer maize production in the arid regions of northwest China. A trial was conducted to investigate the combined effects of planting method, N fertilizer type, and application rate on maize growth, physiological characteristics, yield, and water and nitrogen utilization efficiencies in 2021 and 2022. The two planting methods were ridge-furrow planting with full film mulching (RM) and flat planting without film mulching (NM). There were five RM treatments, which were slow-release N fertilizer (SRNF) applied at 100 (RM1), 150 (RM2), 200 (RM3), and 300 kg N ha–1 (RM4) and conventional N fertilizer (CNF) at 300 kg N ha–1 (RM5). There were also three NM treatments, which were SRNF at 300 kg N ha–1 (NM1), CNF at 300 kg N ha–1 (NM2), and a no-nitrogen control (NM3). The results indicated that the combined SRNF and RM treatments synergistically improved the leaf area index (LAI) and chlorophyll content, promoted plant growth development, and improved aboveground dry matter (ADM) accumulation, where the maximum ADM accumulation rate under RM1–RM4 increased 25.95–39.78
To address the problems of frequent seasonal drought, extensive irrigation, and poor fruit quality in the main citrus-producing areas of the middle reaches of the Yangtze River, a regulated deficit irrigation experiment was conducted under protected cultivation during 2021–2022. Conventional irrigation during the fruit enlargement stage (Stage III) and the fruit coloration and sugar accumulation stage (Stage IV) served as the control (CK). Four water-deficit treatments were applied in both stages: light (LD, 75
Crop growth models are powerful tools for evaluating crop yield and water productivity under specific environmental and agricultural management systems. With the widespread adoption of plastic film mulching, multiple crop growth models have been tailored to simulate film mulched field conditions. However, comprehensive comparative research on the simulation performance and functional characteristics of these mulching-adapted models remain limited. In this study, three film mulching-compatible models-AquaCrop, SWAP, and CropSPAC were compared in their capabilities to simulate field water and heat dynamics and crop growth processes. Model evaluation was conducted based on field maize experiments in Shiyang River Basin of the arid region of Northwest China, which included WF (full irrigation), WM (medium irrigation, 70
Seasonal drought and inappropriate fertilizer management are important factors limiting efficient mango production. In this study, a field experiment was conducted to investigate the effects of irrigation and fertilizer management on canopy structure, photosynthetic characteristics, fruit yield, irrigation water use efficiency (IWUE), partial fertilizer productivity (PFP), and fruit quality and to comprehensively compare different water and fertilizer management strategies. An L9(3⁴) orthogonal experimental design was used to evaluate four factors: irrigation amount (IA) and fertilizer application rate during flowering (FF), fruit expansion (FE), and ripening (FR). Three fertilizer application rates were used: 25, 50, and 75 kg ha− 1 (F25, F50, and F75). The three irrigation levels were full irrigation (FI, 100
