Prediction of water requirement of garden pea (Pisum sativum) under hilly agro-ecosystem of Meghalaya

Abstract

The aim of the present study was to evaluate various empirical methods of estimating evapotranspiration to predict water requirement of garden pea (Pisum sativum. L.) under mid hill altitudinal conditions of hilly agro-ecosystem of Meghalaya. Field experiments were conducted during 2007 and 2008 at ICAR farm located at Umiam, Meghalaya. Various empirical equations were evaluated based on the meteorological data. Study revealed that water requirement of garden pea estimated by Hargreaves method was in close agreement (4.4% deviation) with the actual water requirement (489.1 mm), followed by Blaney-Criddle method and FAO Pan method with deviations of –90.0 (–22.6%) and –175.0 mm (–55.7%), respectively. The other empirical methods predicted high water requirement than the actual value. Hence, Hargreaves method could be considered the most suitable among evaluated methods for predicting water requirement of pea in hill agro-ecosystem of Meghalaya.