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Drainage research is the study of agricultural drainage systems and their effects to arrive at optimal system design.

Contents

Aspects to be taken into account

Figure 1.
Figure 1.

Agricultural land drainage has agricultural, environmental, engineering, economical, social and socio-political aspects (Figure 1). Drainage is the natural or artificial removal of surface and sub-surface water from a given area Agriculture refers to the production of goods through the growing of plants and fungi and the raising of domesticated Animals The study of agriculture See also Nature The natural environment, commonly referred to simply as the environment, is a terminology that is comprised of all living and Engineering is the Discipline and Profession of applying technical and scientific Knowledge and An economy is the realized social system of production exchange distribution and consumption of goods and services of a country or other area Definition In the absence of agreement about its meaning the term "social" is used in many different senses referring among other things to attitudes Politics Politics is the process by which groups of people make decisions
All these aspects can be subject of drainage research.
The aim (objective, target) of agricultural land drainage is the optimized agricultural production related to:

  1. reclamation of agricultural land
  2. conservation of agricultural land
  3. optimization of crop yield
  4. crop diversification
  5. cropping intensification
  6. optimization of farm operations. Soil conservation is set of management strategies for prevention of Soil being eroded from the earth’s surface or becoming chemically altered by overuse In Mathematics, the term optimization, or mathematical programming, refers to the study of problems in which one seeks to minimize or maximize a real function In Agriculture, crop yield (also known as "agricultural output" is not only a measure of the Yield of cereal per unit area of land under cultivation A farm is an area of land including various structures devoted primarily to the practice of producing and managing food ( Produce, Grains, or Livestock

Systems analysis

Figure 2.
Figure 2.

The role of targets, criterion, environmental and environmental factors is illustrated in Figure 2.
In this figure criterion factors are factors influenced by drainage on the one hand and determining the agricultural performance on the other.
An example of a criterion factor is the depth of the water table:

  1. A drainage system influences this depth; the relation between drainage system design and depth of water table is mainly physical and can be described by drainage equations. The water table is the level at which the ground water pressure is equal to Atmospheric pressure. Watertable control is the practice of controlling the water table in agricultural land by subsurface drainage with proper criteria to improve the crop production
  2. The depth of the water table as a criterion factor needs to be translated into a criterion index to be given a numerical value that represents the behavior of the water table on the one hand and that can be related to the target (e. g. crop production) on the other hand.
  3. The relation between criterion index and target can often be optimized, the maximum value providing the ultimate aim while the corresponding value of the criterion index can be used as an agricultural drainage criterion in the design procedure. In Mathematics, the term optimization, or mathematical programming, refers to the study of problems in which one seeks to minimize or maximize a real function

Crop response processes

Figure 3.
Figure 3.

The underlying processes in the optimization insert of Figure 2 are manyfold. The processes can be grouped into mutually dependent soil physical, soil chemical/biological, and hydrological processes (Figure 3). Soil physics is the study of soil physical properties and processes Soil chemistry studies the chemical characteristics of soil Soil chemistry is affected by mineral composition organic matter and environmental factors Hydrology (from Greek Yδωρ hudōr, "water" and λόγος logos, "study" is the study of the movement distribution and quality of
The soil physical processes include soil aeration, soil structure, soil stability, and soil temperature. Aeration is the Process by which Air is circulated through mixed with or dissolved in a Liquid or substance Soil structure is determined by how individual soil Granules clump or bind together and aggregate and therefore the arrangement of soil pores between them Temperature is a physical property of a system that underlies the common notions of hot and cold something that is hotter generally has the greater temperature
The chemical processes include soil salinity, soil acidity and soil alkalinity. Soil salinity is the salt content in the soil Salt affected soils are caused by excess accumulation of salts typically most pronounced at the soil surface Acid sulfate soils are naturally occurring soils sediments or organic substrates (e Alkali or alkaline soils are Clay Soils with a relatively high exchangeable sodium percentage a relative high PH (> 9 a poor soil structure and a low
The hydrological processes include evaporation, runoff, and soil salinity. Evaporation is the process by which Molecules in a Liquid state (e RUNOFF was the first Computer Text formatting program to see significant use Soil salinity is the salt content in the soil Salt affected soils are caused by excess accumulation of salts typically most pronounced at the soil surface
Examples of processes can be found in R. J. Oosterbaan, 1994 [1] .

Field data

Water table and crop production
Water table and crop production

In drainage research the collection and analysis of field data is important (R. J. Oosterbaan, 2002 [2] . )
In dealing with field data one must expect considerable random variation owing to the large number of natural processes involved and the large variability of plant and soil properties and hydrological conditions. A random variable is a rigorously defined mathematical entity used mainly to describe Chance and Probability in a mathematical way
An example of a relation between crop yield and depth of water table subject to random natural variation is shown in the attached graph. The graph was made with the SegReg program, see segmented regression. Segmented regression is a method in Regression analysis in which the Independent variable is partitioned into intervals and a separate line segment is fit to each
When analysing field data with random variation a proper application of statistical principles like in regression and frequency analysis is necessary. Statistics is a mathematical science pertaining to the collection analysis interpretation or explanation and presentation of Data. In statistics regression analysis is a collective name for techniques for the modeling and analysis of numerical data consisting of values of a Dependent variable (response In Cryptanalysis, frequency analysis is the study of the frequency of letters or groups of letters in a Ciphertext.

References

  1. ^ R. J. Oosterbaan, 1994, Agricultural Drainage Criteria. In: H. P. Ritzema (ed. ), Drainage Principles and Applications, Publication 16, ILRI, p. 635-690. International Institute for Land Reclamation and Improvement, Wageningen, The Netherlands. ISBN 90 70754 3 39. Free download from Articles page of www. waterlog. info
  2. ^ R. J. Oosterbaan, 2002, Drainage Research in Farmers' Fields: Analysis of Data. Free download from www.waterlog.info

See also

External links

Miscellaneous

Watertable control is the practice of controlling the water table in agricultural land by subsurface drainage with proper criteria to improve the crop production Salinity control relates to controlling the problem of soil salinity and reclaiming salinized agricultural land
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