Drip irrigation in coffee crop under different planting densities: Growth and yield in southeastern Brazil

Abstract

A B S T R A C TIrrigation associated to reduction on planting spaces between rows and between coffee plants has been a featured practice in coffee cultivation. The objective of the present study was to assess, over a period of five consecutive years, influence of different irrigation management regimes and planting densities on growth and bean yield of Coffea arabica L.. The treatments consisted of four irrigation regimes: climatologic water balance, irrigation when the soil water tension reached values close to 20 and 60 kPa; and a control that was not irrigated. The treatments were distributed randomly in five planting densities: 2,500, 3,333, 5,000, 10,000 and 20,000 plants ha -1 . A split-plot in randomized block design was used with four replications. Irrigation promoted better growth of coffee plants and increased yield that varied in function of the plant density per area. For densities from 10,000 to 20,000 plants ha -1 , regardless of the used irrigation management, mean yield increases were over 49.6% compared to the non-irrigated crop.Irrigação por gotejamento em cafeeiros sob diferentes densidades de plantio: Crescimento e produtividade no Sudeste do Brasil R E S U M O Associada ao adensamento da lavoura, a irrigação tem sido prática de destaque na cafeicultura. Objetivou-se, neste trabalho, avaliar a influência de diferentes regimes de irrigação e densidades de plantio sobre o crescimento vegetativo e a produtividade média de cafeeiros Coffea arabica L, ao longo de cinco anos. Os tratamentos constaram de quatro regimes de irrigação: balanço hídrico climatológico; irrigações com base nas tensões de 20 e 60 kPa, além de uma testemunha não irrigada, os quais foram distribuídos aleatoriamente em cinco densidades de plantio 2.500; 3.333; 5.000; 10.000 e 20.000 plantas ha -1. O delineamento experimental em blocos casualizados em esquema de parcelas subdivididas foi utilizado com quatro repetições; verificou-se que a irrigação promove maior crescimento das plantas de cafeeiro e aumenta a produtividade, que varia em função da densidade de plantas por área. Obtiveram-se, para as densidades de 10.000 e 20.000 plantas ha -1 , independente do manejo da irrigação utilizado, aumentos médios de produtividade acima de 49,6% em relação ao cultivo não irrigado.

Integrated Chemometric Approach to Optimize Sample Preparation for Detecting Metabolic Changes Provoked by Abiotic Stress in Coffea arabica L. Leaf Fingerprints

“…Current analysis on irrigation technologies to improve food availability generally focus on production yields but does not bring information or understanding about molecular changes occurring in plants. [9][10][11][12][13] Metabolite concentrations and diversities present in vegetal material provide integrated information about cellular function at the molecular level with which it is possible to determine cell or tissue phenotype responses to environmental and even genetic alterations besides predicting organism behavior for possible improvements. [14][15][16] The group of metabolites (i.e., metabolome) of a cell or vegetal tissue has a rapid response to any environmental alteration, although, owing to the enormous diversity existing in organisms, changes at the molecular level have been considered to be quite unique for each kind of plant increasing the difficulty of generalizing biomarkers as a function of specific stresses.…”

Evolution and current scenario of irrigated area in Brazil: Systematic data analysis

“…The area with localized irrigation showed higher values than those of center pivot in 2017 ( Figure 2B), due to its demand in the Southeast region, mainly in coffee crops (Assis et al, 2014), which grew by 37% in the number of trees planted between 2006 and 2017, and citrus (Palaretti et al, 2011;Santos et al, 2016) ( Figure 3B). In addition, the lower demand for water and inputs caused localized irrigation to expand to areas previously occupied by other irrigation systems (ABIMAQ, 2018).…”

Effect of seedling fibrous roots on field performance of hybrid coffee varieties

“…Days to flowering was measured on a plot basis as the number of days from the date of transplanting to when approximately 50% of the plants in a plot produced flowers (Assis et al, 2014;Tefera et al, 2016). The plant height was measured at full fruit bearing (22 months after transplanting) from the base of the stem to the plant apex using graduated ruler (Assis et al, 2014;Tefera et al, 2016). The stem diameter of the main stem was measured at full fruit bearing at 5 cm above the ground using Vernier Calliper (Assis et al, 2014;Tefera et al, 2016).…”

“…The plant height was measured at full fruit bearing (22 months after transplanting) from the base of the stem to the plant apex using graduated ruler (Assis et al, 2014;Tefera et al, 2016). The stem diameter of the main stem was measured at full fruit bearing at 5 cm above the ground using Vernier Calliper (Assis et al, 2014;Tefera et al, 2016). The length of bearing primary branches was measured from the point of attachment to the main stem to the apex using graduated ruler as an average value of four longest bearing primaries per plant (Esther and Adomako, 2010).…”