JWSS - Journal of Water and Soil Science

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Data from the birth weight (BW), the average daily gain from birth to weaning (ADG) and the weaning weight (WW) of 1182, 1099 and 1099 lambs were respectively collected and applied to estimate the maternal effects on heritabilities as well as on the determination of the environmental factors. The data were collected from Shahrbabak Sheep Breeding Research Station within five year, from 1993 to 1998. The effects of the year of birth, the age of the dam and its sex on all the traits were significant. The type of birth had no effect on BW but it was significant for the other two traits. Estimates of (co)variance components and genetic parameters were obtained by restricted maximum likelihood, using single and two-trait animal models. Based on the most appropriate fitted model, direct heritability of BW, ADG and WW were estimated at 0.10± 0.06, 0.21 ±0.08 and 0.22± 0.09, respectively. The maternal heritability for the three traits was also estimated at 0.27± 0.04, 0.15 ±0.05 and 0.19 ±0.05, respectively. Direct genetic and phenotypic correlations between BW and ADG BW and WW ADG and WW were estimated at 0.85 and 0.41 0.82 and 0.48 and 0.99 and 0.99, respectively. Ignoring maternal effects in animal model caused overestimation of direct heritability. Thus maternal effects are significant sources of variation for early growth traits and their ignorance in the animal model causes inaccurate genetic evaluation of the lambs.

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The transport process of chemical-fertilizers, radioactive materials and other solutes in soils and porous media is important to understand the environmental and economic effects of industrial, agricultural and urban waste disposal methods. In unsaturated porous media, large gradient in aqueous osmotic potential derives significant water vapor fluxes towards regions of high solute concentrations. In this research, the effects of osmotic potential (resulting from salinities of 0.5, 1 and 1.5%) on water vapor transport in three soil textures (silty clay loam, loam and sandy loam) were examined by using a physical laboratory model. Then, the experimental results were compared with Kelly and Selker (2001) model for validation of the predicted water vapor transport. The results showed that the rate of water vapor transport reduces significantly as soil texture gets heavier. For example, in salinity of 0.5% and 5th day of experiment, the amount of transported vapor in sandy loam, loam and silty clay loam soils was 0.362, 0.196 and 0.12 kg/m2, respectively. Large osmotic potential near the high solute concentration in soils caused significant vapor movement toward dense solutions. In salinity of 1.5%, transported vapor in these soils was 1.47, 0.723 and 0.38 kg/m2, respectively. Total water vapor movement until the 15th day was more than the 5th day. Comparison of experimental results with Kelly and Selker model results, using Mathcad PLUS 6.0 software, showed a good agreement between the observed and predicted data. Since water vapor delivered from uncontaminated soils to the contaminated soils can result in increased contaminant plume volume, these physical and chemical processes must be included in the predictive models of contaminant transport in the vicinity of concentrated sources

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Heavy metals in water resources are one of the most important environmental problems in most of countries. Up to now, various methods for removing these metals including using low price materials have been used. In this study, two new absorbents (zizyphus spinachristi leaf and its fly ash) were studied for adsorption of cadmium from aqueous solutions using batch experiments. The effect of contact time, pH, and amount of adsorbent on adsorption efficiency was evaluated and the best kinetic and isotherm model was determined. Results showed that optimal absorption of pH was 5 and 6 for zizyphus spinachristi leaf and its fly ash, respectively. The equilibrium time was 45 min for zizyphus spinachristi leaf and 30 min for ash. Adsorption efficiency was increased by increasing the adsorbent dose. By comparing the parameters of isotherm models, it was observed that the cadmium adsorption capacity of fly ash (4.27 mg/gr) was higher than that of zizyphus spinachristi (3.91 mg/gr).

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Drip irrigation is a new method of irrigation that is rapidly growing in different countries. The emitters are the most important parts of a drip irrigation system. Many factors such as physical, chemical and biological clogging, pressure, water temperature affect the emitter´s uniformity of water emission. In this study, to investigate pressure effect on the hydraulic performance of emitters, 7 kinds of compensating emitters in the market were selected and studied in laboratory conditions. For this purpose, a drip irrigation system was designed in irrigation laboratory in faculty of water sciences engineering, Shahid Charm University, Ahwaz. Average flow of emitters, Manufacturer´s coefficient of variation of emitter(CV), emission uniformity(EU), Christiansen coefficient of uniformity(CU) and Flow Variations for all types of emitters at pressures of 5, 10, 15 and 20 meters were calculated and compared. Also, in order to compare the pressure compensating capacity, for every emitter the equation of Flow- pressure was extracted. Results showed that the D-type emitter has the best hydraulic performance from among the emitters tested. Therefore, to achieve higher efficiency and also to use it on slopes and uneven lands this emitter is recommended as the best. However, performances of other emitters are also acceptable.

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Infiltration is the most crucial process affecting surface irrigation uniformity and efficiency as it is the mechanism that transfers and distributes water from the surface to the soil profile. As a direct method of infiltration measurement, the volume balance method requires time, accuracy and high costs. Moreover, before the land preparation and at the research phase the use of this method is not feasible. The revised USDA- NRCS method is used to convert the infiltration parameters to different hydraulic conditions. In this study, the accuracy of the original and revised USDA-NRCS method in the estimation of furrow irrigation infiltration parameters in Amir Kabir Agro Industrial sugarcane fields of Ahvaz was evaluated. For this purpose, infiltration parameters and the cumulative 6 hour infiltration for furrow irrigation systems of this region were estimated using four methods of original USDA- NRCS, revised USDA- NRCS for border irrigation, revised USDA- NRCS for furrow irrigation and field measurement (inflow-outflow). For evaluation of the results, four indices including average prediction error of model (Er), distribution into 45° line (λ), determination coefficient (R2) and average relative error of model (Ea) were used. According to the results, the revised USDA- NRCS method for border irrigation with average values of λ, R2, Er and Ea equal to 0.95, 97, 6.5 and 7.6 percent, respectively was the best estimate of cumulative infiltration.

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In order to increase the distribution uniformity of sprinkler irrigation systems, some influential parameters such as wind speed, arrangement, space and type of sprinklers must be studied and controlled. In this study, a set of experiments were conducted based on ISO 7749/2(1990) standard to evaluate the ADF 25⁰ and Nelson, F80APV sprinklers. To study the effects of wind velocity, operating pressure, various sprinkler layouts and spacing on water distribution uniformity, the experiments were conducted based on a single sprinkler method. Four operating pressures in the range of one recommended by the manufacturer for each sprinkler were applied and three sprinklers’ spaces on lateral pipelines (22, 26, and 30 m) were simulated for square and rectangular layouts to estimate the water distribution uniformity. Results showed that the distribution uniformity of Nelson sprinkler in existing wind velocities and operating pressures had smaller changes than ADF sprinkler. The 4.5 bar pressure for ADF sprinkler was better than other pressures, and operating pressures for Nelson sprinkler did not have any significant effect on distribution uniformity. With the decrease of sprinkler spacing to the wetting diameter in the simulated space, uniformity coefficient was increased. The recommended sprinkler spacing to the wetting diameter for these sprinklers ranged from 0.4 to 0.5 for square and rectangular layouts.