The Effect of Deficit Irrigation of Salicornia persica With Seawater on Dry Matter and Water Productivity in Boushehr Region

This study was conducted to investigate the response of salicornia persica, directly irrigated with Persian Gulf saline water in Bushehr region, to reducing its required water and to determine the relationships between applied water and dry matter. The experiment was performed in a randomized complete block design with 3 replications. The treatments included T1, T2, T3, T4, T5 and T6, with total applied water of 6700, 8800, 9600, 10000, 11800 and 14700 m3.ha-1, respectively. The results showed that the applied water has important role in the dry matter; So that in the treatments of T1 to T5 with a significant difference it applied water, no significant increase was obtained for the crop yield. The average dry matter of the treatments was relatively constant and about 3000 kg.ha-1. However, increasing the volume of applied water in T6 treatment had a positive and significant effect on dry matter and increased it to 4600 kg.ha-1. Under the mentioned field conditions, Salicornia water productivity (WP) was obtained between 0.15 to 0.44 kg.m-3. Therefore, to achieve yields of 5 tons per hectare and more, a timely and sufficient water supply system (by shortening of the irrigation cycles) will be required for the Salicornia fields. The latter conclusion confirms the positive response of Salicornia to the increase of applied water, which can well illustrate the challenge of water supply importance in Salicornia fields.