Effect of Drip Irrigation Using Brackish Water and Soil Remediation Materials in Salted and Sodium Soil of Pistachio Orchards (Case Study: Kerman County)

Kerman province is currently suffering problems in water resources management and its freshwater storages are restricting continuously. A large number of wells are now salinized and lost their suitable quality in this province. Thus, a particular management is needed to use brackish water resources so as to achieve an acceptable level of agricultural production. In this study, the effect of irrigation by sodium and brackish water on soil and pistachio trees in Kerman county was investigated using I1 to I6 treatments. Six brackish water treatments in complete randomized blocks in three repetition were studied. Irrigated water was distributed uniformly in all treatments. The results showed that the use of gypsum in the treatments I3 and I6 leaded on better removal of harmful sodium ions than in the treatments I1, I2, I4 and I5 where soil was solely leached by irrigation water. Adding gypsum reduced the average of electrical conductivity, SAR and ESP of the soil by 39.35%, 47.4% and 41.3% respectively in comparison to before test conditions. Besides, using gypsum was resulted in improvement of yield performance by 11.9% and 15.6% for treatments I3 and I6 respectively and improvement of quality indicators such as increment of 1000 kernel weight, reduction in both blank pistachios percentage and non-split shells.