Abstract
This work aimed to assess the performance of different thermal infrared (TIR)-based physiological indicators (PI) as an alternative to the stem water potential (Ψs) and stomatal conductance (gs) to monitor the water status of grafted drip-irrigated ‘Regina’ cherry trees. In addition, we evaluated the usefulness of piecewise linear regression for finding PI thresholds that are important for post-harvest regulated deficit irrigation (RDI) management. With this purpose, an irrigation experiment was carried out in the post-harvest period. Trees were submitted to three Ψs-based water-stress treatments: T0 (fruit grower management treatment, or control) (Ψs > − 1.0 MPa, without-to-low water stress); T1 (low-to-mild water-stress treatment = − 1.0 > Ψs > − 1.5 MPa); and T2 (mild-to-severe water-stress treatment = − 1.5 > Ψs > − 2.0 MPa). The results indicated that the trees were more stressed in T2 than in T0. In the former, averages of Ψs and gs were − 1.75 MPa and 372 mmol m−2 s−1, whereas they were − 1.56 MPa and 427 mmol m−2 s−1 in T0. The piecewise model allowed determining the water-stress thresholds of almost all studied PI. The breakpoints yielded by this analysis indicated that trees at Ψs lower than − 1.5 MPa had a gs lower than 484 mmol m−2 s−1. These results also showed that TIR-based PI, whose equations incorporate a temperature normalization, are a better indicator of cherry tree water status than those without normalization. The derived TIR-based PI threshold values could be used as a reference for managing drip-irrigated ‘Regina’ cherry trees.
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The data that support the findings of this study are available on request from the corresponding author, [SE-M].
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Acknowledgements
The authors thank Sofía Pinto, Tiare Guajardo, Estefanía Guzmán, Javiera Martínez, Leonor Barraza, Bárbara Abarca, Cristian Michea, and Eloísa Baeza (Alumni School of Agronomy in the Universidad Católica del Maule), and to Luis Ahumada (C. Abud and Cia.), and especially to Lucas Carrasco-Soto, for their support in the field measurements and experiment maintenance. The authors also thank Marcela Suazo for reviewing this manuscript.
Funding
The Chilean government funded this research and the manuscript preparation through the Agencia Nacional de Investigación y Desarrollo (ANID) through the “Programa FONDECYT Iniciación en la Investigacion,” año 2017 (Grant No. 11170323) and “Fondo De Investigación Estratégica En Sequía (asignación rápida) año 2021” (Grant No. FSEQ210004).
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Conceptualization and methodology: MC-B; investigation and data curation; MC-B, AB-H and CÁS; formal data analysis: MC-B, KU, SE-M and JN-R; writing—original draft preparation: MC-B; writing—reviewing and editing: MC-B, SE-M, SO-F, SF and KU. All authors contributed to the visualization and revision of the complete manuscript. They all worked extensively in the interpretation of the results and the discussion.
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Carrasco-Benavides, M., Espinoza-Meza, S., Umemura, K. et al. Evaluation of thermal-based physiological indicators for determining water-stress thresholds in drip-irrigated ‘Regina’ cherry trees. Irrig Sci 42, 445–459 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00271-024-00916-8
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00271-024-00916-8