Evaporation from bare gravelly soil influenced by embedded gravel and soil texture

In dry farming, reduction of soil water losses is one of the most important factors of success. In this study, to investigate the effect of different levels of gravel and soil texture on evaporation and soil water content of bare soil, an experiment was conducted in a completely randomized design with 12 treatments and 3 replications. Soil textures were sandy loam, loam and silty clay contain 0, 10, 20 and 30% volumetric gravel. Results showed that soil texture and gravel resulted in significant effect on the amount of content soil water. Maximum and minimum soil water loss was occurred in silty clay soil with 20% volumetric gravel (99.4%) and loam soil with 10% volumetric gravel (88.1%), respectively. The effect of interaction between texture and gravel content was only significant in cumulative evaporation from soil surface. As the amount of gravel increased, the amount of soil decreased. Therefore, soil water content and evaporation decreased. Therefore. collecting gravels from the field and using them as mulch, or cultivating in areas with low gravels level can be resulted in soil water saving in dry farming.