Course Aim
- Develop and describe the use of a soil moisture retention curve.
- Define basic components of the hydrologic cycle and how they can be measured or estimated.
- Identify evapotranspiration calculation process and use available models to estimate.
- Describe movement of water in soils.
- Identify key components of an irrigation system and their function.
- Calculate irrigation rates, irrigation efficiency, and plant water use efficiency.
- Identify different types of irrigation delivery systems and the strengths and weaknesses of each.
- Determine an irrigation schedule for a system
Course Description:
This course is designed to teach participants about irrigation such that they would have the skills to evaluate an irrigation system, identify parts of a system, and develop an irrigation schedule based on system characteristics. This course is designed for non-engineers although quantitative ability will be required for calculations and analysis.
Course Content:
- Introduction to course and Canvas
- Introduction to irrigation (history of irrigation, how irrigation changed agriculture, water conflict)
- Soils and water - part 1 (properties/characteristics, terminology)
- Soils and water - part 2 (laboratory measurements and field measurements)
- Water source for irrigation
- Evapotranspiration (basics of evapotranspiration, different ET estimation techniques, reference ET, online tools/resources) (Migliaccio)
- Irrigation system components
- Irrigation calculations
- Irrigation hydraulics
- Irrigation efficiency
- Irrigation uniformity
- Irrigation scheduling tools
