Effect of Irrigation Technique on the Efficiency of Furrow Irrigation

International Conference on Chemical, Environmental and Biological Sciences (CEBS-2015) March 18-19, 2015 Dubai (UAE)
Effect of Irrigation Technique on the Efficiency
of Furrow Irrigation
Abdelmoneim Mohammed1, Nahla Abdeen2, and Abdel Rhman Hamid3

front of the flow reached the end of the furrow, the flow is
completely cutoff.
Surge flow irrigation is defined as the intermittent
application of irrigation water to furrows or border, creating a
series of on and off modes of constant or variable time spans
[5]. Water application efficiency is the volume of water
needed and made available for evapotranspiration by the crop
to avoid undesirable water stress in the plants through the
growing cycle divided by the volume of water delivered to the
field [6].
Water storage efficiency becomes important when water
supplies are limited, also when salt problems exist. The water
storage efficiency should be kept high to maintain a favorable
salt balance [7]. The important characteristic of irrigation is
uniform distribution of irrigation water throughout the root
zone [8]. Therefore, the objective of the study was to
determine application, distribution and storage efficiency for
furrow irrigation using four techniques namely; surge flow,
bunds, cut-back and cut-off.
Abstract—This study was conducted at the Demonstration Farm,
Faculty of Agriculture, University of Khartoum, Shambat, clay soil
with the objective to determine application, distribution and storage
efficiencies for furrow irrigation using four techniques namely; surge
flow, bunds, cut-back and cutoff. The furrow length was 82 m. The
four techniques were randomly distributed in the experimental area
and the design followed was Randomized Complete Block Design.
The results showed that the highest application efficiency of 82% was
obtained with surge irrigation technique followed by bund (64%) cutback (49%) and cutoff (32%), respectively. Results of distribution
efficiency showed that the highest efficiency of 98% was obtained
with the surge irrigation technique followed by the cut-back (95%),
bund (92%), and cutoff (90%), respectively. Surge irrigation
technique resulted in the highest storage efficiency of 73% followed
by bund (58%), cut-back (44%) and cutoff (29%), respectively.
Keywords— Irrigation efficiency, surge irrigation, cutoff, cutback, bunds.
I. INTRODUCTION
F
URROW irrigation avoids flooding the entire field surface
II. MATERIALS AND METHODS
by channeling the flow along the primary direction of the
field slope using furrows, creases, or corrugations [1]. Furrow
irrigation best suits clean tilled crops planted in rows [2]
Bunds are strips made along the run or along the furrow so
as to increase the duration between applying the water and
infiltration i.e. to increase. The contact time or opportunity
time [1]. In many countries the name bund is associated with
various kinds of erosion-controlling banks which have grass or
shrubs planted on them. The object of the grass may be
whether to trap silt from surface runoff water, or for the roots
to help bind the bank together [3].
Cut-back is commonly used to reduce the quantity of
irrigation runoff. This method utilizes a large furrow stream to
rapidly advance the length of the field and wet-up the furrow.
When the water has reached the end of the field, the size of
furrow stream is cut-back to one third or to one half of the
original furrow flow [4]. While cut off is a traditional practice
to stop the flow when the advancing wetting front reached
75% of the furrow length. The test of the traditional practice
was conducted using flow rate 1.5 times or more than the flow
rate used with cut-back method. When the advance wetting
The experiment was conducted at the Demonstration Farm
of Faculty of Agriculture, University of Khartoum, Shambat at
latitude l5o 40'n and longitude 32°32'E. The climate is
described as tropical arid. The first experimental period
extended from November 2010 to January 2011, the second
from April 2011 to June 2011 and the last from October 2011
to November 2011. The four techniques studied were surge,
bund, cut-back and cutoff (Traditional) irrigation techniques.
The furrow length was 82m and 0.8m width. The total area of
the experiment was 1700 m2.
The techniques were randomly distributed in the
experimental area. The experimental design followed was the
Randomized Complete Block Design. Soil mechanical analysis
was conducted at the Soil Science Laboratory of the Faculty of
Agriculture, University of Khartoum. Samples were taken
from three locations chosen randomly in the field. From each
location four samples were taken at depths of 0.2, 0.4, 0.6 and
0.8 m down the soil profile. Mean for each depth was taken to
represent the soil textural class.
Land preparation was carried out with disc plough (to a
depth of 0.25 m), disc harrow to break the clods and firm the
top soil, leveler, land surveying and land ridging. A head ditch
was excavated at the upper part of the field. A stabilizer ditch
was excavated parallel to the head ditch (from which it was
supplied with the irrigation water) in order to facilitate the
control and measurement of the inflow rate. Three uniform
Abdelmoneim Mohammed1 is with Dept. of Agric. Eng., Fac. of Agric.,
Univ. of Khartoum, Sudan.
Nahla Abdeen2 was with Dept. of Agric. Eng., Fac. of Agric., and Univ. of
Khartoum, Sudan.
Abdel Rhman Hamid3 is with Dept. of Agric. Eng., Fac. of Agric. Tech. &
Fish-Sci., AI Neelain Univ., Sudan. (e-mail: [email protected]).
http://dx.doi.org/10.15242/IICBE.C0315068
168
International Conference on Chemical, Environmental and Biological Sciences (CEBS-2015) March 18-19, 2015 Dubai (UAE)
III. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
furrows with 0.8 m spacing and 82 m long were chosen for
each technique. Heads of 0.25 m were maintained in the
stabilizer ditch. Stream size of mean value of 3 L/s was turned
into each furrow using two siphon tubes with 0.05 m inside
diameter and 2.8 m long, a discharge of 1.5 L/s was obtained
as a furrow stream to apply water. Cutoff time, when the
advance wetting front of the flow reached the end of the
furrow, the flow was completely cutoff. Cut-back time, when
the water has reached the end of the field, the size of furrow
stream is cut-back to half (1.5 L/s) of the original flow into the
furrow. Surge flow time, the duration of time between
successive inflow periods called the cycle time, was chosen so
that several on-off cycles were required to complete the
advance phase of the irrigation. The cycle ratio is ratio of on to
off times. [9]. defined water application efficiency for an
irrigated area (Ea%) as the ratio, expressed in percent, of depth
of water stored in root zone to the water applied during
irrigation and expressed as follow:
Table I shows the percentage particle size distribution of the
soil obtained for increments of 0.2 m down the soil profile to
0.8 m depth. According to USDA soil textural classification
chart, the soil was classified as clay.
There were no significant differences between the four
incremental depths for the clay, silt and sand percentages but
clay increased with depth. Whereas, silt percentage decreased
with depth, while sand percentage remained relatively
constant. This agreed with results obtained by [11] and [12].
Results of application efficiency as affected by the irrigation
technique were shown in Table II. The highest application
efficiency of 82 % was recorded by surge irrigation technique,
followed by bund (64%) cut-back (49%) and cutoff (32%),
respectively.
This can be attributed to the fact that surge irrigation at the
midpoint of the furrow offered greater opportunity for water
intake because it applied water in cycles, a state which resulted
Ds
in a high amount of water being stored in the root zone, which
Ea % 
 100
Df
in turn resulted in a high application efficiency as stated by
[4]. The highest distribution efficiency of 98% was recorded
Where:
by surge irrigation technique, followed by cut-back (95%),
Ea% = water application efficiency, as percentage.
Ds = average depth of irrigation water infiltrated or stored bund (92%) and cutoff (90%), respectively. This indicates that
the distribution efficiencies obtained under all tested irrigation
in the root zone during irrigation
techniques were high. These results may be due to the regular
Df = average depth of irrigation water delivered to the farm.
The concept of water storage efficiency (Es%) is useful to slopes and the suitable volume of water required to complete
an advance gives the potential to increase the distribution
assist in the evaluation of application efficiency and irrigation
uniformity as stated by [13], [14] and [15].
practice. According to [8] storage efficiency can be expressed
The highest storage efficiency of 73% was obtained under
as follow:
surge irrigation technique followed by bund (58%), cut-back
Ws
(44%) and cutoff (29%), respectively. This can be attributed to
Es % 
 100
Wn
the fact that in surge irrigation technique, the water was
Where:
applied intermittently in an amount of more than the
Es% = water storage efficiency, as percentage.
infiltration rate of the soil. Also, in surge irrigation technique
Ws = water stored in the root zone during irrigation.
the duration of the rest period was long enough for most of
the applied water to infiltrate before the next cycle was started
Wn = water stored in the root zone prior to irrigation.
Water stored in the root zone can be determined using the and this had resulted in higher storage efficiency compared to
the conventional method as stated by [16]. and [17]. [5] stated
following formula:
that surge irrigation technique reduces run off losses and high
Mc Ad  Mc Bd
We 
 D  ETo ( for 3 daysirrigation
)
efficiencies might be obtained using that technique.

4
Where:
McAd = moisture content on depth basis after irrigation.
McBd = moisture content on depth basis before irrigation.
ETo = reference crop evapotranspiration (mm/day).
Distribution efficiency (Ed%) expresses the extent to which
water was uniformly distributed along the run. According to
[10] water distribution efficiency can be expressed as follow:
IV. CONCLUSIONS
In this study surge irrigation technique resulted in the
highest overall irrigation efficiencies compared to all other
irrigation techniques used.
TABLE I
SOIL PARTICLE SIZE DISTRIBUTION FOR EACH 0.2 M FROM THE SURFACE TO
0.8M DEPTH
Depth(m)
Clay%
Silt %
Sand1%
Class
0.0-0.2
45.28
31.31
23.40
Clay
0.2-0.4
48.43
29.11
22.43
Clay
0.4-0.6
46.50
32.25
18.10
Clay
0.6-0.8
50.00
31.34
16.00
Clay
y
Ea (%)  (1  )100
d
Where:
d = Average depth of water stored along the run during the
irrigation (mm).
http://dx.doi.org/10.15242/IICBE.C0315068
169
International Conference on Chemical, Environmental and Biological Sciences (CEBS-2015) March 18-19, 2015 Dubai (UAE)
TABLE II
APPLICATION DISTRIBUTION AND STORAGE EFFICIENCIES OF THE FOUR
IRRIGATION TECHNIQUES
Efficiency
Irrigation
technique
Surge
Bund
Cut-back
Cutoff
Application
(Ea%)
82
64
49
32
Distribution
(Ed%)
98
92
95
90
Storage
(Es%)
73
58
44
29
Over all
(%)
59
34
21
8
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