Consequences of Changes in Water Balance of the Lower Volga Territories after Large-Scale Hydro-Melioration

  • Serazhutdin A.Kurbanov, Victor V. Borodychev, Nina A.Pronko, Alexander S.Falkovich

Abstract

The paper is devoted tothe problemof preventingland degradation caused by irrigation.The research objective was to investigate the character and regularities of degradation soil-melioration processes in the soils of the Lower Volga regionafterwater amelioration, which significantly increased the water input on those territories. It is shown that groundwater rise at a speed of 0.2-0.8 m/year and soil salinization in the Lower Volga region during the first 20-30 years of water amelioration development were determined by both objective (very poor natural drainage, poor filtration ability of water-bearing rocks, and groundwater mineralization) and subjective reasons (small share of irrigated lands equipped with drainage systems, dominance of water retaining cultures in irrigated crop rotation, unreasonably high irrigation rates, wide use of early spring irrigations of perennial grass and winter crops. For the first time, the features of soil-ameliorative processes in saline and swampy soils of fallow lands were established. It was stated that self-melioration of soils in saline fallow lands occurs if drainage excludes the groundwater participation in the water regime of root layer, which should be taken into account when involving abandoned lands into agriculture.

Keywords: fallow lands melioration¾irrigated lands melioration¾soil degradation¾water balance

Published
2020-02-27
How to Cite
Alexander S.Falkovich, S. A. V. V. B. N. A. (2020). Consequences of Changes in Water Balance of the Lower Volga Territories after Large-Scale Hydro-Melioration. International Journal of Advanced Science and Technology, 29(3), 3719 - 3729. Retrieved from https://sersc.org/journals/index.php/IJAST/article/view/5052
Section
Articles