Evaluation of Growth Traits of Rosmarinus Officinalis L. under Deficit Irrigation

Abstract

Water scarcity is the most important factor constraining agricultural production all over the world and water shortage in agriculture must be established to use the deficit irrigation. In order to study the effects of the regulated deficit irrigation and partial root zone drying on the growth traits of Rosmarinus Officinalis L., an experiment was conducted in the center of seed and plant production of IranShahr municipality in 2017. The experiment treatments were arranged as a randomized complete block design with three replications. The irrigation regimes consisted of full irrigation, regulated deficit (RDI75 and RDI55) and partial root zone drying irrigation (PRD75 and PRD55). The results showed that deficit irrigation at 75 and 55 percent of full irrigation resulted in saving 18.6 and 34.3 percent of water consumption, respectively. Comparison of full irrigation and PRD75 showed that dry weight, height of plants and number of shoots per plant were decreased by 6.7, 14.3 and 12.1 percent, respectively. However, proper development of root in PRD75 increased 12.9 percent of water productivity. Therefore, by considering the problems of water scarcity, it is possible to provide PRD75 as a superior treatment and a suitable strategy to cope with the water crisis in order to move towards a sustainable agricultural system.

Keywords

• partial root zone drying irrigation
• regulated deficit irrigation
• water productivity