Irrigation scheduling is a fundamental component of irrigation management and is vital for optimum agricultural production. It varies with the type of crop, soil, climate, method of irrigation, and agricultural practices. There are different methods for irrigation scheduling. This chapter discusses some of the commonly used methods of irrigation scheduling.

A pipe is a closed conduit, and when it runs full its hydraulics is different from the hydraulics of open channels in which the upper surface of flow is exposed to the atmosphere. Pipes or closed conduits are used in sprinkler and drip irrigation systems to carry water from the source of water supply to the individual sprinkler or emitter. Water may be conveyed from a reservoir through a pipeline. These systems are also called pressurized irrigation systems. This chapter reviews the principles of pipeline hydraulics.

In Chapter 6, we looked at the analysis of one-dimensional arrays of data. Along the way, we introduced the for loop and the branching statement. Looping enables us to make some set of calculations repeatedly. Branching enables us to ask questions of our data. In this chapter, we extend our discussion to two-dimensional arrays.

One of the neat features of Python is that it works very well as a “glue” language. That is, it enables us to manage many, if not all, parts of a scientific or engineering workflow, within a single computing environment. In earlier chapters, we saw how Python can be used for reading in data, doing calculations on the data, and making plots of the results. We have also seen that Python can be used to generate “data,” in the form of model or simulation results, which can also be analyzed and graphed. In the past, scientists and engineers used separate programs to work on each of these steps in their workflow, and these separate programs did not communicate with each other except through files.

In the previous chapters, the lists and arrays of data we have looked at have been pretty small. Partly, this is because it is easier to understand small datasets, which helps us when we are learning a new tool. However, what makes using a programming language (as opposed to Excel) a better tool to analyze data is the ease with which a program written in a programming language can be scaled up to handle a large dataset. In Excel, it is not so easy to go from, say, 500 rows of data to 500 million rows of data.

Land surface characteristics, especially slope and highs and lows or irregularities, substantially affect the efficiency of irrigation systems. Indeed, the type of irrigation system to be employed is determined by the land surface itself. Ideally the land surface should be such that the irrigation water moves as uniformly as possible but the natural landscape is not always so. Therefore, the natural landscape or topography is altered, entailing the movement of earth from one place (high) to another (low). Land leveling or smoothing is one of the most important surface irrigation management and design practices. The objective of this chapter is to discuss the methodology for altering the landscape and various aspects thereof.

Border irrigation is one of the popular methods of surface irrigation, especially in developing countries, largely because there is little energy required for irrigating agricultural fields as water flows under gravity, the cost involved is low, and the skill needed to construct borders is minimal. This chapter discusses the method and design of border irrigation.