In recent years, water availability has been a key issue for many horticultural crops. The Apple and Pear Australia Ltd, APAL, recently hosted a webinar on options for orchard management through drought.
Mark Skewes, Research Scientist at SARDI, shared his research on farm monitoring in irrigated citrus, almonds, avocado and grapevines in the Riverland and Sunraysia regions during the Millennium drought. His research documents the various techniques adopted by growers during the drought and how actions affected the survival, productivity and recovery of orchards.
Growers employed a variety of strategies to adapt to drought conditions these include:
- Lease/Buy water,
- Consolidate water,
- Convert systems to drip,
- Adopt partial rootzone drying as an irrigation technique,
- Use partial cover sprinklers,
- Hedge or topping canopy,
- Skeletonising,
- Anti-transpirant spray,
- Crop removal.
To keep up to date with events and upcoming webinars visit APAL.
Content sources and further information
- APAL webinar recording
- Managing horticultural crops with less water
- Managing citrus orchards with less water
- Managing avocado with less water in the Mallee fact sheet
- Managing citrus orchards with less water fact sheet
- Managing grapevines with less water in the Mallee fact sheet
- Managing almonds with less water in the Mallee fact sheet
