Canopy management and water use efficiency in vineyards under Mediterranean semiarid conditions

Abstract

This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License 4.0, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. photosynthesis among others, through modifying some relevant variables like temperature or time of sun exposure [6,7].Due to this, vegetative or root development and reproductive yield can be modified by water consumption and sun exposure among other factors. Shoot growth may be more strongly affected by water limitations than its reproductive growth, but also, roots development can be limited. These limitations could appear especially in warm, dry climates or under water scarcity conditions, mainly when reproductive demands for carbon were at its highest and physical conditions limiting their development during the cycle [8,9].Therefore, an adequate balance among crop load, training -trellising system and water management should be required in warm climates as a key point in order to assess the expected quality for grapes and wine.The main objective of the present work was to examine the effects of three different training systems on water consumption (relations between soil-plant) and also, their effect on yield and grape quality under Mediterranean warm climate conditions. Canopy management and water use efficiency in vineyards under Mediterranean semiarid conditionsMario de la Fuente, Rubén Linares, and José Ramón Lissarrague Departamento de Producción Agraria, Grupo de Investigación en Viticultura, Universidad Politécnica de Madrid, Ciudad Universitaria s/n, 28040 Madrid, Spain Abstract. One of the main objectives in Mediterranean vineyards is the water use efficiency due to its scarcity. During the growing season, total available water is significantly lower than the evaporative demand, being this a limiting factor for quality production. Beside other factors, the choice of an adequate training system can help mitigate this negative effect in regard with soil-plant hydric consumption. The use of porous systems can help plants establish a better leaf distribution inside the clusters area, providing more space and enhancing certain physiological processes, both in leaves and berries (de la Fuente et al., 2013), and causing a better utilization of natural resources.Water consumption, dynamics and hydric relations in plants (water potential) and soil (soil water tension and capacity) have been studied on three different systems: sprawl system with 12 shoots m -1 (S1); sprawl system with 18 shoots m -1 (S2) and vertical positioned system or VSP with 12 shoots m -1 (VSP1). Yield, dry matter partitioning and berry and must composition have also been obtained at the maturity stage.The main objective of this study was to show the differences in consumption and water use efficiency due to different canopy managements, and to quantify these effects on yield, berry and must composition.The results showed that the vertical system (VSP1) benefited less from total available water at medium lev...