Impact of Shallow Groundwater on Evapotranspiration Losses from Uncultivated Land in an Irrigated River Valley
Publication: Journal of Irrigation and Drainage Engineering
Volume 137, Issue 8
Abstract
In many agricultural regions of the West, decades of intensive irrigation have produced shallow water tables under not only cultivated fields but also the nearby uncultivated land. It is possible that the high water tables under the uncultivated lands are substantially increasing evapotranspiration (ET) rates, which would represent an unnatural and potentially nonbeneficial consumptive use. The objective of this paper is to quantify loss of water that occurs from uncultivated lands in a semiarid irrigated river valley (the Lower Arkansas River Valley in southeastern Colorado). A remote-sensing algorithm is used to estimate actual ET rates on 16 dates on the basis of Landsat satellite images. On the same dates, water table depths, soil moisture values, and soil water salinities are measured at up to 84 wells distributed across three study sites. On the basis of a water balance of the root zone, it is estimated that 78% of the ET is supplied by groundwater upflux at these sites. It is also observed that the ET and groundwater upflux decrease with increasing water table depth. A regression analysis indicates that the spatial variations in ET are most closely related to variations in vegetation-related attributes, whereas soil moisture and water table depths also explain substantial amounts of the variation. Valley-wide implications for reducing nonbeneficial ET through water table control also are discussed.
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Acknowledgments
The authors thank the Colorado Water Institute, the Colorado Agricultural Experiment Station, the U. S. Geological SurveyUSGS, the Southeastern Colorado Water Conservancy District, the Lower Arkansas Valley Water Conservancy District, and the U. S. Bureau of ReclamationUSBR for their financial support; the U. S. Bureau of Reclamation and the Natural Resources Conservation Service for supplying equipment; Jim Hasenack, Larry McElroy, and Dr. D. L. Teeter for granting extensive access to their property; Chad Martin, Emery Crump, Ben Weber, Brian Little, Todd Vandegrift, Amin Haghnegahdar, Mike Coleman, and Matt Bostrom for field assistance; Mike Bartolo for use of the Arkansas Valley Research Center; Enrique Triana, Eric Morway, and Joy Labadie for their technical assistance; and two anonymous reviewers for their helpful suggestions. The views and conclusions contained in this document are those of the authors and should not be interpreted as representing the opinions or policies of the U.S. Government. Mention of trade names or commercial products does not constitute their endorsement by the U.S. Government.
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Information & Authors
Information
Published In
Journal of Irrigation and Drainage Engineering
Volume 137 • Issue 8 • August 2011
Pages: 501 - 512
Copyright
© 2011 American Society of Civil Engineers.
History
Received: May 20, 2010
Accepted: Feb 3, 2011
Published online: Feb 10, 2011
Published in print: Aug 1, 2011
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