Water Relations in the Irrigation Scheduling of Olive Orchards

Abstract

Olive trees (Olea europea L) are traditional Mediterranean specie. The agricultural management of olive orchards has been changed from 90’s of the last century. The most important change is the great increase of the irrigation surface. This new water demand has been produced in water scarcity areas. Such conditions and the traditional rainfed management of the orchards have produced very restrictive water used. The traditional irrigation scheduling based on water budget is a useful tool in conditions of full irrigation, but most of the olive orchards are deficit irrigated. In the last decades, plant water status measurements have been suggested in different fruits trees in order to improve the management of deficit irrigation. In this work, results of several experiments in different olive orchards using midday stem water potential and trunk daily diameter are presented. The water stress sensitivity and the real commercial utility are discussed