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ARS Home » Pacific West Area » Riverside, California » Agricultural Water Efficiency and Salinity Research Unit » Research » Publications at this Location » Publication #396839
Research Project: Water Management for Crop Production in Arid and Semi-Arid Regions and the Safe Use of Alternative Water Resources

Location: Agricultural Water Efficiency and Salinity Research Unit

Title: Quantifying citrus water use efficiency by evapotranspiration partitioning using in-situ measurements

Author
item YUAN, YUSEN - University Of California, Riverside
item AJAMI, HOORI - University Of California, Riverside
item Anderson, Raymond - Ray
item Wang, Dong
item Kelley, Jason
item WANG, LIXIN - Indiana University-Purdue University

Submitted to: Meeting Abstract
Publication Type: Abstract Only
Publication Acceptance Date: 10/4/2022
Publication Date: 12/12/2022
Citation: Yuan, Y., Ajami, H., Anderson, R.G., Wang, D., Kelley, J.R., Wang, L. 2022. Quantifying citrus water use efficiency by evapotranspiration partitioning using in-situ measurements. Meeting Abstract. N/A.

Interpretive Summary:

Technical Abstract: Groundwater over drafting impacts the sustainability of agricultural production in the Central Valley of California, especially with increases in frequency and intensity of droughts. Partitioning of evapotranspiration (ET) into evaporation (E) and transpiration (T) is important for understanding plant water use, reducing evaporation loss, and improving water use efficiency and groundwater recharge estimation. However, estimating ET components at the ecosystem scale remains an observational and theoretical challenge requiring application and integration of multiple in-situ methods with hydrologic models. In this study, we estimated citrus water use, one of the top fruit products in the Central Valley valued at $2.4 billion in 2021. We conducted several field campaigns from June to July 2022 at two orchards planted with navel oranges and tangerines in the Central Valley to estimate the variability of T/ET using three independent in-situ methods: the water stable isotope method, the flux variance similarity method using eddy covariance data, and the micro-lysimeter method. As an orchard management practice, every alternate tree within each row was recently removed in the navel orange field and created a sparse canopy cover during the field campaign. No tree removal occurred in the tangerine orchard. Preliminary results showed that the T/ET values in the navel orange orchard and the tangerine orchard were 0.54 and 0.67, respectively, indicating a lower water use efficiency than the average global terrestrial T/ET values (0.8-0.9). This study enabled to better understand citrus water use, and provided a set of in-situ datasets for model development and evaluation.