Efectos del riego deficitario y de la carga de cosecha sobre las relaciones híbricas y la respuesta agronómica del ciruelo japonés cv. Black-Gold

Se ha estudiado el efecto de las restricciones hídricas en distintos períodos fenológicos, y de la carga de cosecha sobre la respuesta agronómica y las relaciones hídricas de una plantación joven de ciruelo Japonés cv. Black-Gold. En post-cosecha, las restricciones hídricas permitieron ahorros de agua de hasta un 29% sin afectar ni a la intensidad de floración ni el cuajado ni el crecimiento del fruto del año siguiente. Sin embargo, a medio plazo, tres años, el estrés hídrico aplicado en post-cosecha puede reducir la produción de la plantación debido al efecto acumulado de las restricciones sobre el crecimiento del árbol. El estrés hídrico llevado a cabo durante las fases II y toda la fase III del crecimiento del fruto, redujo su tamaño de forma proporcional a la integral de estrés. La restricción moderada del riego, antes y después de la cosecha, auanque permitió el mayor ahorro de agua (30%), provocó una reducción demasiado severa en el crecimiento del árbol, además de afectar al crecimiento del fruto. La carga alta de cosecha redujo el tamaño final del fruto en un 16%, pero permitió aumentar la cosecha en un 46% además de afectar al crecimiento vegetativo del árbol. La carga también afectó a las relaciones hídricas del árbol. Por otra parte se ha demostrado la eficacia de los dendómetros y del potencial de hoja no transpirante como indicadores de estrés hídrico. Finalmente se evaluó la utilidad de los sensores Watermark que respondieron razonablemente bien a las restricciones del riego, en particular cuando fueron severas, y permiten estimar con cierta precisión el estado hídrico del árbol, en particular para Ym<-40kPa.Intrigliolo Molina, DS. (2005). Efectos del riego deficitario y de la carga de cosecha sobre las relaciones híbricas y la respuesta agronómica del ciruelo japonés cv. Black-Gold [Tesis doctoral no publicada]. Universitat Politècnica de València. https://doi.org/10.4995/Thesis/10251/1869Palanci

Assessment of a Remote Sensing Energy Balance Methodology (SEBAL) Using Different Interpolation Methods to Determine Evapotranspiration in a Citrus Orchard

"(c) 2015 IEEE. Personal use of this material is permitted. Permission from IEEE must be obtained for all other users, including reprinting/ republishing this material for advertising or promotional purposes, creating new collective works for resale or redistribution to servers or lists, or reuse of any copyrighted components of this work in other works."A surface energy balance algorithm for land (SEBAL) for estimating evapotranspiration (ET) has been parameterized and tested in a 400-ha drip irrigated citrus orchard. Simultaneously, during three growing seasons, energy fluxes were measured using Eddy Covariance. Instantaneous fluxes obtained with SEBAL using 10 images from Landsat-5 were compared with the measured fluxes. The Perrier function was the best method for properly estimating the roughness momentum length for discontinuous canopies, as in citrus orchards. Crop height was estimated using LIDAR data. In general, SEBAL performed well for net radiation estimation but failed in soil heat flux estimation. Latent heat estimations from the SEBAL model had a relative root mean square error (rRMSE) of 0.06 when compared with measurements obtained by Eddy Covariance. Three procedures were tested for up-scaling the instantaneous ET estimates from SEBAL to daily ET values: 1) assuming the fraction between the actual ET and the reference ET is constant throughout the day; 2) using actual local crop coefficient curves; and 3) using an up-scaling factor where the fraction of hourly ET to daily ET equals the ratio of hourly to daily global solar radiation. This last method gave acceptable results for daily ET estimations (rRMSE = 0.09) and for 15day ET (rRMSE = 0.19), and its main advantage is that no local data are required. It is concluded that the SEBAL methodology can be successfully applied for determining actual ET, even in discontinuous citrus canopies. However, additional parameterizations of momentum roughness length were needed in order to obtain reliable ET determinations.This work was supported in part by MINECO project Rideco-Consolider CSD2006-0067 and in part by Interreg IV Sudoe project "Telerieg."Jiménez Bello, MÁ.; Castel, JR.; Testi, L.; Intrigliolo Molina, DS. (2015). Assessment of a Remote Sensing Energy Balance Methodology (SEBAL) Using Different Interpolation Methods to Determine Evapotranspiration in a Citrus Orchard. IEEE Journal of Selected Topics in Applied Earth Observations and Remote Sensing. 8(4):1465-1477. https://doi.org/10.1109/JSTARS.2015.2418817S146514778

The evolution of smart irrigation

[SPA] Son muchos los avances tecnológicos en el sector de la fertirrigación, enfocados cada uno a un área concreta. Pero si nos alejamos para cambiar la perspectiva, se hace necesaria una herramienta para la gestión global de toda esta tecnología. Un amplio trabajo está detrás del desarrollo de la plataforma GENHIDRO, que permitirá adquirir información agronómica, analizarla, y tomar decisiones para actuar sobre el sistema de riego. Se podrá alcanzar la aplicación efectiva de tecnologías encaminadas a gestionar el riego inteligente. [SPA] There are many technological advances in the fertigation sector, each one focused on a specific area. But if we move away to change the perspective, a tool for the global management of all this technology is necessary. Extensive work is behind the development of the GENHIDRO platform, which will make it possible to acquire agronomic information, analyze it, and make decisions to act on the irrigation system. It will be possible to achieve the effective application of technologies aimed at managing smart irrigation.Al Proyecto de Investigación y Desarrollo con referencia IDI-20190146, titulado “Desarrollo e implantación de un equipo de ferticontrol por lisimetría de pesada para uso en agricultura intensiva”, en colaboración con la empresa AGROSOLMEN, S.L., cofinanciado por el Fondo Europeo de Desarrollo Regional (FEDER) a través del Programa Operativo Plurirregional de España 2014-2020. Y al Grupo de Investigación de Ingeniería Agromótica y del Mar, principalmente al Dr. José Miguel Molina Martinez y a la Dra. Dolores Parras Burgos, por su disposición constante y ayuda incondicional para conseguir los objetivos alcanzados. Y al Dr. Diego S. Intrigliolo Molina, siempre aportando su experiencia investigadora, que me anima a mejorar cada día

Sistema de cuantificación del balance hídrico para sistema de riego de plantas cultivadas en maceta

Número de publicación: 2 565 127 Número de solicitud: 201431431Sistema de cuantificación del balance hídrico para sistema de riego de plantas cultivadas en maceta que comprende: - una estructura con una superficie de apoyo de la maceta (5), - medios de pesaje de la maceta (8) dispuestos bajo la superficie de apoyo (1) de modo que el peso de la maceta (5) descansa sobre ellos, - un primer recipiente (11) para permitir la recogida del agua drenada por la maceta (5), - primeros medios de pesaje (12) para medir el peso del primer recipiente (11), - un segundo recipiente (16) susceptible de contener agua para el riego de la planta, sostenido por un soporte (15) desplazable, - segundos medios de pesaje (17) para medir el peso del segundo recipiente (16), - una electroválvula (18) para controlar el vaciado del segundo recipiente (16), - una unidad de control (10) configurada para obtener el peso del consumo hídrico de la planta.Universidad Politécnica de Cartagen

Standardization of the dimensions of a portable weighing lysimeter designed to be applied to vegetable crops in Mediterranean climates

The progress made in developing information and communication technologies (ICTs) and the fact that water resources are becoming increasingly scarce make precision agriculture a very valuable tool for efficient and sustainable crop management, particularly for irrigation and fertilisation. In line with this, the water balance estimate is considered one of the most accurate methods for estimating crops’ water requirements. The Agromotic Engineering and Sea Research Group of the Universidad Politécnica de Cartagena (Spain) has worked in this direction to obtain portable weighing lysimeters with improved functions compared to traditional measurement systems. This study analysed the most important vegetable crops in south-eastern Spain to standardise suitable dimensions so that these portable weighing lysimeters can monitor practically all of today’s vegetable and herbaceous crops in Mediterranean climates. The dimensions established for the cultivation tank are 150 cm long, 45 cm wide, and 50 cm deep, with an equipment resolution of up to 0.09 mm expressed as water lamina. The validation over seven irrigation events established that the structural system achieved here allows precise monitoring of the water exchanges produced in the cultivation tank, so this portable weighing lysimeter can be useful for the efficient management of fertigationResearch and development project with reference IDI-20190146, entitled “Development and implementation of a weighing lysimeter ferticontrol equipment for use in intensive agriculture”, in collaboration with the company AGROSOLMEN, S.L., cofinanced by the European Regional Development Fund (FEDER) through the Spanish Multiregional Operational Programme 2014–2020. Preciriego (RTC-2017-6365-2) project co-financed by FEDER and AEI-Spain

Unmixing-Based Fusion of Hyperspatial and Hyperspectral Airborne Imagery for Early Detection of Vegetation Stress

"© 2014 IEEE. Personal use of this material is permitted. Permission from IEEE must be obtained for all other uses, in any current or future media, including reprinting/republishing this material for advertising or promotional purposes, creating new collective works, for resale or redistribution to servers or lists, or reuse of any copyrighted component of this work in other works.” Upon publication, authors are asked to include either a link to the abstract of the published article in IEEE Xplore®, or the article’s Digital Object Identifier (DOI).Many applications require a timely acquisition of high spatial and spectral resolution remote sensing data. This is often not achievable since spaceborne remote sensing instruments face a tradeoff between spatial and spectral resolution, while airborne sensors mounted on a manned aircraft are too expensive to acquire a high temporal resolution. This gap between information needs and data availability inspires research on using Remotely Piloted Aircraft Systems (RPAS) to capture the desired high spectral and spatial information, furthermore providing temporal flexibility. Present hyperspectral imagers on board lightweight RPAS are still rare, due to the operational complexity, sensor weight, and instability. This paper looks into the use of a hyperspectral-hyperspatial fusion technique for an improved biophysical parameter retrieval and physiological assessment in agricultural crops. First, a biophysical parameter extraction study is performed on a simulated citrus orchard. Subsequently, the unmixing-based fusion is applied on a real test case in commercial citrus orchards with discontinuous canopies, in which a more efficient and accurate estimation of water stress is achieved by fusing thermal hyperspatial and hyperspectral (APEX) imagery. Narrowband reflectance indices that have proven their effectiveness as previsual indicators of water stress, such as the Photochemical Reflectance Index (PRI), show a significant increase in tree water-stress detection when applied on the fused dataset compared to the original hyperspectral APEX dataset (R-2 = 0.62, p 0.1). Maximal R-2 values of 0.93 and 0.86 are obtained by a linear relationship between the vegetation index and the resp., water and chlorophyll, parameter content maps.This work was supported in part by the Belgian Science Policy Office in the frame of the Stereo II program (Hypermix project-SR/00/141), in part by the project Chameleon of the Flemish Agency for Innovation by Science and Technology (IWT), and in part by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Education (MEC) for the projects AGL2012-40053-C03-01 and CONSOLIDER RIDECO (CSD2006-67). The European Facility for Airborne Research EUFAR (www.eufar.net) funded the flight campaign (Transnational Access Project 'Hyper-Stress'). The work of D. S. Intrigliolo was supported by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness program "Ramon y Cajal."Delalieux, S.; Zarco-Tejada, PJ.; Tits, L.; Jiménez Bello, MÁ.; Intrigliolo Molina, DS.; Somers, B. (2014). Unmixing-Based Fusion of Hyperspatial and Hyperspectral Airborne Imagery for Early Detection of Vegetation Stress. IEEE Journal of Selected Topics in Applied Earth Observations and Remote Sensing. 7(6):2571-2582. https://doi.org/10.1109/JSTARS.2014.2330352S257125827

Irrigation-Advisor-A Decision Support System for Irrigation of Vegetable Crops

Climate change will intensify water scarcity, and therefore irrigation must be adapted to save water. Operational tools that provide watering recommendations to end-users are needed. This work presents a new tool, Irrigation-Advisor (IA), which is based on weather forecasts and is able to separately determine soil evaporation and crop transpiration, and thus is adaptable to a broad range of agricultural situations. By calculating several statistical indicators, IA was tested against the FAO-56 crop evapotranspiration (ETcFAO) methodology using local crop coefficients. Additionally, IA recommendations were compared with current standard practices by experienced farmers (F). Six field experiments with four widely cultivated species (endive, lettuce, muskmelon and potato) were performed in Southeast Spain. Irrigation water applied, crop yield, aboveground biomass and water productivity were determined. Crop water needs underestimations (5%–20%) were detected when comparing IA against ETcFAO, although the index of agreement proved reasonable adjustments. The IA recommendations led to water savings up to 13% when compared to F, except for lettuce, with a 31% surplus in irrigation when using IA. Crop yield was not compromised and water productivity was increased by IA. Therefore, IA mimicked the farmers0 irrigation strategies fairly well without deploying sensors on-site. Nevertheless, improvements are needed for increasing the accuracy of IA estimations.The authors thank the owners of the experimental fields (Madrid and Galindo families) and David Hortelano (CEBAS-CSIC) for his help with field determinations. This research: including the APC, was funded by the Spanish MINISTERIO DE ECONOMÍA Y COMPETITIVIDAD (MINECO) with FEDER co-financing, projects “RiegoAsesor” and “Preciriego” (grant numbers RTC-2015-3453-2 and RTC-2017-6365-2) and by the European Commission with project “SHui” (grant number: 773903)

PROYECTO FIGARO: PLATAFORMA PARA LA GESTIÓN INTEGRAL Y EFICIENTE DEL RIEGO

[EN] Water and energy consumptions at plot level irrigation are issues of broad interest with an important environmental and economic impact. The solution to this double challenge requires the implementation of “precise irrigation”. In this work is shown the under developing software system FIGARO (Flexible and PrecIse IrriGation PlAtform to Improve FaRm Scale Water PrOductivity), which is part of a project co-funded by the European Commission under the 7th Framework Programme, in the scope of “Precision technologies to improve irrigation management and increase water productivity in major water-demanding crops in Europe” (KBBE.2012.1.1-03). The aim is to develop a tool to support decision-making for end users that let them perform irrigation scheduling with the aim of reducing water, energy and fertilizers consumptions, as well as yield crop is maximized. Implementation and validation of the FIGARO platform is being performed in several countries with different crops and weather conditions. First results in the year 2014, in citrus and grapevine crops, suggest increases in water productivity with savings close to 30% of water and 36% of energy at Water User Association level.[ES] El consumo de agua y energía en el ámbito del riego en parcela es una cuestión de amplio interés y consecuencias para el medio ambiente y la economía. La solución a este doble reto exige la implantación del denominado “riego de precisión”. En el presente trabajo se presenta la plataforma informática en desarrollo FIGARO (Flexible and PrecIse IrriGation PlAtform to Improve FaRm Scale Water PrOductivity), la cual forma parte de un proyecto financiado por la Unión Europea dentro del 7º Programa Marco, en el ámbito “Precision technologies to improve irrigation management and increase water productivity in major water-demanding crops in Europe” (KBBE.2012.1.1-03). El objetivo principal es desarrollar una herramienta de soporte a la toma de decisiones, que permita a los agricultores realizar programaciones de riego dirigidas a reducir el uso de agua, energía y fertilizantes, a la vez que se maximiza la productividad de las cosechas. La puesta en marcha y validación de la plataforma FIGARO se está llevado a cabo en diferentes países, con cultivos y condiciones climáticas diversas. Los primeros resultados de la campaña de 2014 en cultivos de cítrico y vid, sugieren incrementos de la productividad del agua con ahorros próximos al 30% de agua y del 36% de energía a nivel de comunidad de regantes.Este trabajo ha sido financiado por Unión Europea dentro del 7º Programa Marco, en el ámbito “Precision technologies to improve irrigation management and increase water productivity in major water-demanding crops in Europe” (KBBE.2012.1.1-03).Martínez Gimeno, M.; Martínez Alzamora, F.; Jiménez Bello, MÁ.; Royuela Tomás, Á.; Manzano Juarez, J.; Intrigliolo Molina, DS. (2015). PROYECTO FIGARO: PLATAFORMA PARA LA GESTIÓN INTEGRAL Y EFICIENTE DEL RIEGO. En XXXIII CONGRESO NACIONAL DE RIEGOS. Valencia 16-18 junio de 2015. Editorial Universitat Politècnica de València. https://doi.org/10.4995/CNRiegos.2015.1457OC

Preciriego: Un proyecto de colaboración público‐privada para adaptar la irrigación de precisión al riego por goteo de los cultivos leñosos

En las últimas décadas se han realizado grandes avances para ajustar la dosis de riego a aplicar las necesidades hídricas promedio de una parcela, tendiendo hacia un riego de precisión. El siguiente reto que aborda el proyecto Preciriego es tener en cuenta la variabilidad en las parcelas para ajustar el riego a las posibles diferencias existentes. Mientras en cultivos herbáceos más extensivos y bajo riego por aspersión con Pivots este desafío ha sido ya abordado, se han realizado menos trabajos en cultivos leñosos y riego por goteo. En esta comunicación se integran técnicas de teledetección de rango cercano utilizando drones y modelos hidráulicos de precisión para llevar a cabo una zonificación de un viñedo comercial para definir tres zonas con distintos índices de vigor vegetativo. Posteriormente, se ha aplicado un riego diferencial para cada zona de modo que, manteniendo la dosis promedio establecida de unos 1000 m3/ha, la misma ha sido aplicada de forma diferencial en función del vigor de las cepas. Para ello se ha variado el diseño agronómico del riego, utilizando distintas distancias entre goteros en función de la zonificación realizada. De este modo, sin tener que sectorizar ni aplicar tiempos o frecuencias de riego distintas para cada zona, la pluviosidad de la instalación fue distinta. Dicha estrategia de riego de precisión ha sido validada en campo, demostrando que las zonas de mayor vigor vegetativo han aprovechado mejor la mayor dotación de riego empleada teniendo una mayor producción frente a otras zonas con menor desarrollo vegetativo donde se ha considerado que la productividad de las cepas podía estar limitada por otros factores al margen del riego. Otra de las ventajas del sistema de riego de precisión radica en la automatización de la programación llevada a cabo desarrollada mediante nuevos programadores con posibilidad de tele‐lectura y fácil instalación en parcela. La puesta en práctica de los sistemas de riego de precisión sigue adelante en el proyecto Preciriego con otros ensayos en marcha en cultivos leñosos y hortícolas al aire libre

Use of an Abscission Agent for Harvesting Mandarins in Spain

Spain accounts for more than 55% of the European citrus production and is predominantly oriented towards fresh market. Harvesting accounts for more than 50% of production costs and methods of mass harvesting are under research. Abscission agents decrease fruit detachment force of mature fruits before harvest, thus improving harvesting machines performance. However, they may affect the production of the following season or blemish the fruit skin, making the product unmarketable for whole fruit, fresh consumption. This work was aimed at studying whether the application of ethephon improves mechanical harvesting of mandarins and affects the quality of fruit, the physiology and yield of trees. Trees were harvested with a trunk shaker, and ethephon was sprayed at 600 and 1200 mg/L in 4 and 7 L/tree applications in commercial orchards. The use of ethephon affected the amount of radiation intercepted by the canopy at long term in the first year, but it did not in the second year. It also slightly improved fruit removal but increased defoliation.Moreno, R.; Chueca, P.; Garcera, C.; Intrigliolo Molina, DS.; Molto, E.; Torregrosa Mira, A. (2012). Use of an Abscission Agent for Harvesting Mandarins in Spain. Acta Horticulturae. 965:105-109. doi:10.17660/ActaHortic.2012.965.12S10510996