Water Management in Horticultural Crops (1+1)

Introduction

• Irrigation water is a manageable input in crop production. As such it should be managed on scientific lines to optimize crop production by avoiding excessive applications leading to water logging and wastage of scarce irrigation water.
  
• The objective of the water management is not always been in obtaining the highest yield per unit land area. In this present day context it is the sustained profit which assumes the prime importance. A it was discussed previously, The crop growing environment like climate and soil types vary from place to place. Hence the practices developed also vary from place to place and is also applicable on water management practices.
  
• The experiments conducted in these places and assessment of water requirement and scheduling can be taken as a guide for irrigation and water management.
• The soil environment is not always supporting a higher productivity in interaction with water management. The soils may have or develop problems when water availability exceeds the requirement and saturates or stagnates. This would cause problems in the form of poor aeration and salt concentration.
  
• In arid and semi-arid regions soils are affected due to rise in water table and accumulation of salts leading to unfavourable soil-water-plant relationships and decrease in crop productivity.