Agricultural Irrigation

Through this new survey, producers have the opportunity to assist Nebraska Extension with identifying factors that may contribute to increasing or decreasing storm damage to center pivots.

As irrigation season approaches, producers may find it beneficial to review the basics on how soil, water and plants all work together to grow crops.

Inspired by an extension event survey comment, Dr. Bijesh Maharjan, associate professor and extension specialist at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln Panhandle Research, Extension and Education Center, conceptualized the soil health cycle (SHC) as an iterative soil health management cycle to achieve agricultural sustainability.

Alfalfa is a tough perennial with established rooting depths down eight feet or more. Depending on deep soil profile moisture, some varieties can extend spring dormancy and survive up to 45 days without rainfall. However, forage yields drop dramatically, since alfalfa requires about six inches of root available water to produce one ton of forage per acre.

See the results of the 2023 UNL-TAPS Competition for sorghum, SDI corn, sprinkler corn and the newest category for the contest — irrigated popcorn.

Chemigation training for Nebraskans will be offered at nearly 50 in-person sessions from now through April, as well as online.

The Importance of Maintaining High Uniformity of Water Application of Center Pivot

A new pivot valve, created by KZValve of Greenwood, Nebraska, has self-power generating capabilities that could potentially be used in partial variable rate irrigation.

This article provides a brief summary of the irrigation decisions made in the TAPS sorghum, popcorn, SDI corn and sprinkler corn competitions this year.

Results of a three-year study investigating the impact of mitigating water stress during soybean reproductive stages on the two components that comprise yield — seed number and seed mass.

During its inaugural year, the Nebraska Soil Health School educated more than 200 producers and ag industry stakeholders on the latest research and practices for healthy soils to increase crop productivity.

A review of this year's irrigation season in the Panhandle and crop water use expectations for Aug. 28-Sept. 3.

Scheduling the last few irrigations of the season deserves extra attention because the goal is not only to focus on keeping the crop wet enough to produce optimal yields, but also on using up stored soil water. Leaving the field a little drier at the end of the season will save irrigation costs, decrease leaching losses, improve soil conditions for harvest traffic, and save water for future years. Growers also don't want to miss out on capturing off-season precipitation.

Agriculture today is not what it was a decade ago. We are at an interesting pace of agricultural technological innovation and development in sensors, controls, robotics and technology, including irrigation scheduling applications. The declining quantity and quality of freshwater resources in many parts of the world, including the United States, imposes significant challenges for producers, managers, advisors and decision-makers to produce more yield with less water. It is necessary to promote sound management strategies to improve irrigation efficiency and conserve water resources. By using irrigation scheduling applications, producers can make more informed decisions that can lead to higher yields with fewer irrigation inputs. Nebraska is one of the top states that produces maize under different irrigation methods, in third place after Iowa and Illinois. The total irrigated area in Nebraska reaches about 9.3 million acres. More than 85% of the total irrigation areas use the center pivot irrigation system, while about 15% is covered by furrow irrigation and less than 1% is managed by subsurface drip irrigation systems (see fig. 1). A new irrigation scheduling application is being developed to improve irrigation scheduling that can have a substantial impact in using limited water supplies more effectively and increase yield per unit applied of irrigation water and sustain agricultural productivity. At the request of Irriga Global, Lutry, Switzerland, a field test was initiated for the 2022 growing season on maize fields to evaluate the irrigation scheduling application in one of the Irrigation Today.

Drought-stressed Crops and Yield Potential

The key to knowing the correct setting for a chemigation pump is to first determine how many acres per hour the pivot will cover at the desired irrigation application depth or rate.

The estimated crop water use for Nebraska Panhandle crops for the previous week and the upcoming week is shown in this table. It is based on data gathered and calculations made by Gary Stone, Nebraska Extension educator, and Dr. Xin Qiao, extension irrigation and water management specialist, both based at the UNL Panhandle Research and Extension Center in Scottsbluff.

Study Reviews Farmer Irrigation Scheduling Tendencies in Dry Years.