Discussion of "Night Irrigation Reduction for Water Saving in Medium-Sized Systems" by Bert De Bievre, Andres Alvarado, Luis Timbe, Rolando Celleri, and Jan Feyen

• Published in: Journal of irrigation and drainage engineering Vol. 131; no. 2; pp. 218 - 219
• Main Author: Merriam, John L
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: 01-03-2005
• ISSN: 0733-9437
• DOI: 10.1061/(ASCE)0733-9437(2003)129:2(108)

It is very satisfying to see that researchers, as in this paper, are applying their efforts to the farmers' problems of night irrigation. I wish to expand and simplify the presented program by adding to Chamber's (1988) list of reservoir types and Molden and Gates's (1990) list of water delivery qualities, and how to incorporate these additional points as they pertain to night and more flexible on-farm scheduling. Chamber's list of reservoirs-intermediate (canal) storage and on-farm reservoirs-would appear to omit an in-between classification of service-area reservoirs that convert the steady supply rate into a variable daytime-only farm delivery rate. For the small farms on the 17 service areas averaging 65 ha, one or two small reservoirs functioning as an on-farm reservoir would satisfy the night irrigation problem as if the 65 ha were one big farm. It would also provide highly desirable flexibility to the on-farm operation (Merriam 2002), and permit continuous flow at the maximum rate in the supply canal.