Effects of canopy resistance parameterization on evapotranspiration partitioning and soil water contents in a maize field under a semiarid climate

Abstract

Different canopy resistance (r_c) parameterization has been used in land surface models to simulate actual evapotranspiration (ET_c) and soil hydraulic variable for crop fields. However, the influence of r_c parameterization on evapotranspiration (ET) partitioning and soil water dynamics has not been fully investigated with consideration of the coupled soil water and vapor physics. This study investigated the influential mechanisms of five r_c methods (viz., Jarvis, Katerji-Perrier, Massman, Kelliher-Leuning, and Farias) on ET partitioning and soil water contents in an irrigated maize field under a semiarid climate through a soil water and vapor transfer model. The Jarvis method presented the best ET results (R² = 0.86 and RMSE = 0.71 mm·d^–1). Different r_c parameterization mainly altered the simulated amount of soil water contents, while not changed the response of soil water dynamics to irrigation events. By the integrated analysis of the ET partitioning and root-zone water budget, different r_c methods varied in the choice of the optimum irrigation water use strategies. This study identified the direct and indirect impacts of r_c on the ET partitioning and emphasizes the necessity of both the ET partitioning and water supply sources in the decision-making for irrigation water management in semiarid regions.

Graphical abstract

Keywords

Field experiment / STEMMUS-ET model / root-zone water budget / Northwest China

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Supplementary materials

The online version of this article at https://doi.org/10.15302/J-FASE-2024581 contains supplementary materials (Figs. S1–S3; Tables S1–S2).

Acknowledgements

This research was supported by Chinese Universities Scientific Fund (Z1090122048), Cyrus Tang Foundation, Shaanxi Province Science Foundation for Youths (2024JC-YBQN-0531), and Special Project for the Investigation of Basic Resources of Ministry of Science and Technology, China (2022FY101602).

Compliance with ethics guidelines

Lianyu Yu, Huanjie Cai, Delan Zhu, Yuhan Liu, Fubin Sun, Xiangxiang Ji, Yijian Zeng, Zhongbo Su, and La Zhuo declare that they have no conflicts of interest or financial conflicts to disclose. This article does not contain any studies with human or animal subjects performed by any of the authors.

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The Author(s) 2024. Published by Higher Education Press. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0)