VALIDATION OF SURFACE IRRIGATION MODEL SIRMOD UNDER CLAY LOAM SOIL CONDITIONS IN EGYPT

Document Type : Original Article

Authors

1 Water Relations & Field Irr. Dept. National Research Centre, Cairo, Egypt.

2 Agri. Eng. Dep., Fac. of Agric. Ain Shams Univ., Cairo, Egypt

Abstract

Surface irrigation (gravity) is the most dominant method currently accounts for 80-85% of irrigation water use in Egypt and surface application is by far the dominant irrigation method applied throughout the world. However, water use efficiencies with surface irrigation methods tend to be low. In recent years a number of surface irrigation simulation models for assessing surface irrigation system performance have been developed. One of the most commonly used models SIRMOD, developed by Utah State University, has seen wide use and evaluation throughout the world particularly by researchers and has been shown to offer potential for increasing surface irrigation water use efficiencies. The use of the SIRMOD model as a management tool for improving irrigation efficiencies was found to be a valuable aid.
This study aims to validate SIRMOD model for using in Egypt under clay loam soil conditions. The SIRMOD model adequately describes advance and recession times and infiltrated depth under experimental site conditions for the furrow irrigation practice. In particular, for the experimental site the SIRMOD model provided acceptable predictions for 75 m and 50 m furrow lengths under 0.2% field slope, and for 100 m, 75 m and 50 m furrow lengths under 0.5% field slope at the 1st irrigation.  For that, the good predicted values were for the later irrigations than the first one, due to the good relationship between the predicted and measured infiltration depths obtained from SIRMOD model which has high accuracy degree for furrow irrigation management decisions. Generally, predicted advance, recession times and infiltrated depth were highly correlating with measured one at 0.2% field slope more than 0.5% field slope for the two irrigations.

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References

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Misr Journal of Agricultural Engineering
Volume 26, Issue 3
July 2009
Pages 1299-1317

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