Irrigation is the practice of applying controlled amounts of water to land to help grow crops, landscape plants, and lawns. Irrigation has been a key aspect of agriculture for over 5,000 years and has been developed by many cultures around the world. Irrigation helps to grow crops, maintain landscapes, and revegetate disturbed soils in dry areas and during times of below-average rainfall. In addition to these uses, irrigation is also employed to protect crops from frost, suppress weed growth in grain fields, and prevent soil consolidation. It is also used to cool livestock, reduce dust, dispose of sewage, and support mining operations. Drainage, which involves the removal of surface and sub-surface water from a given location, is often studied in conjunction with irrigation.
A levee, dike, dyke, embankment, floodbank, or stop bank is a structure used to keep the course of rivers from changing and to protect against flooding of the area adjoining the river or coast. It is usually earthen and often runs parallel to the course of a river in its floodplain or along low-lying coastlines.
The Wash is a shallow natural rectangular bay and multiple estuary on the east coast of England, United Kingdom. The bay is an inlet of the North Sea. It is the largest estuary system in the United Kingdom, the largest natural bay in England and one of the most important places of conservation in Europe, with several nature reserves.
A tidal bore, often simply given as bore in context, is a tidal phenomenon in which the leading edge of the incoming tide forms a wave of water that travels up a river or narrow bay, reversing the direction of the river or bay's current. It is a strong tide that pushes up the river, against the current.
The Carquinez Strait is a narrow tidal strait located in the Bay Area of Northern California, United States. It is part of the tidal estuary of the Sacramento and the San Joaquin rivers as they drain into the San Francisco Bay. The strait is eight miles (13 km) long and connects Suisun Bay, which receives the waters of the combined rivers, with San Pablo Bay, a northern extension of the San Francisco Bay.
The Sacramento–San Joaquin River Delta, or California Delta, is an expansive inland river delta and estuary in Northern California. The Delta is formed at the western edge of the Central Valley by the confluence of the Sacramento and San Joaquin rivers and lies just east of where the rivers enter Suisun Bay, which flows into San Francisco Bay, then the Pacific Ocean via San Pablo Bay. The Delta is recognized for protection by the California Bays and Estuaries Policy. Sacramento–San Joaquin Delta was designated a National Heritage Area on March 12, 2019. The city of Stockton is located on the San Joaquin River at the eastern edge of the delta. The total area of the Delta, including both land and water, is about 1,100 square miles (2,800 km2). Its population is around 500,000.
The Caloosahatchee River is a river on the southwest Gulf Coast of Florida in the United States, approximately 67 miles (108 km) long. It drains rural areas on the northern edge of the Everglades, east of Fort Myers. An important link in the Okeechobee Waterway, a manmade inland waterway system of southern Florida, the river forms a tidal estuary along most of its course and has become the subject of efforts to restore and preserve the Everglades.
The Oude Rijn is a branch of the Rhine delta in the Dutch provinces of Utrecht and South Holland, starting west of Utrecht, at Harmelen, and running by a mechanical pumping station into the North Sea at Katwijk. Its present-day length is 52 kilometres.
A tidal creek or tidal channel is a narrow inlet or estuary that is affected by the ebb and flow of ocean tides. Thus, it has variable salinity and electrical conductivity over the tidal cycle, and flushes salts from inland soils. Tidal creeks are characterized by slow water velocity, resulting in buildup of fine, organic sediment in wetlands. Creeks may often be a dry to muddy channel with little or no flow at low tide, but with significant depth of water at high tide. Due to the temporal variability of water quality parameters within the tidally influenced zone, there are unique biota associated with tidal creeks which are often specialised to such zones. Nutrients and organic matter are delivered downstream to habitats normally lacking these, while the creeks also provide access to inland habitat for salt-water organisms.
River engineering is a discipline of civil engineering which studies human intervention in the course, characteristics, or flow of a river with the intention of producing some defined benefit. People have intervened in the natural course and behaviour of rivers since before recorded history—to manage the water resources, to protect against flooding, or to make passage along or across rivers easier. Since the Yuan Dynasty and Ancient Roman times, rivers have been used as a source of hydropower. From the late 20th century, the practice of river engineering has responded to environmental concerns broader than immediate human benefit. Some river engineering projects have focused exclusively on the restoration or protection of natural characteristics and habitats.
Flood control is an important issue for the Netherlands, as due to its low elevation, approximately two thirds of its area is vulnerable to flooding, while the country is densely populated. Natural sand dunes and constructed dikes, dams, and floodgates provide defense against storm surges from the sea. River dikes prevent flooding from water flowing into the country by the major rivers Rhine and Meuse, while a complicated system of drainage ditches, canals, and pumping stations keep the low-lying parts dry for habitation and agriculture. Water control boards are the independent local government bodies responsible for maintaining this system.
Surface irrigation is where water is applied and distributed over the soil surface by gravity. It is by far the most common form of irrigation throughout the world and has been practiced in many areas virtually unchanged for thousands of years.
The Rhine–Meuse–Scheldt delta is a river delta in the Netherlands formed by the confluence of the Rhine, the Meuse and the Scheldt rivers. In some cases, the Scheldt delta is considered a separate delta to the Rhine–Meuse delta. The result is a multitude of islands, branches and branch names, in which a waterway that appears to be one continuous stream may have numerous separate names for different sections, e.g. Rhine → Bijlands Kanaal → Pannerdens Kanaal → Nederrijn → Lek → Nieuwe Maas → Het Scheur → Nieuwe Waterweg. Since the Rhine contributes most of the water, the term "Rhine Delta" is commonly used, although this name is also used for the delta where the Alpine Rhine flows into Lake Constance. By some calculations, the Rhine–Meuse–Scheldt delta covers 25,347 km2 (9,787 sq mi), making it the largest in Europe.
Classification of wetlands has been a problematical task, with the commonly accepted definition of what constitutes a wetland being among the major difficulties. A number of national wetland classifications exist. In the 1970s, the Ramsar Convention on Wetlands of International Importance introduced a first attempt to establish an internationally acceptable wetland classification scheme.
This page shows statistical data on irrigation of agricultural lands worldwide.
Irrigation is the artificial abstraction of water from a source followed by the distribution of it at scheme level aiming at application at field level to enhance crop production when rainfall is scarce.
Irrigation in Iran covers 89,930 km2 making it the fifth ranked country in terms of irrigated area.
Gronda lagunare is a term used to indicate the area of the Lagoon of Venice by its mainland shore. The term is derived from the fact that it receives the waters from the rivers and streams which flow into the lagoon from the drainage basin of the plain of the mainland by the lagoon. It is also reached by the tidal flows form he sea., it is meant to be a belt that forms a transition area between the open lagoon and the mainland.
Water use in alluvial fans refers to irrigation systems using the water resources in alluvial fans, mainly river floods and groundwater recharged by infiltration of rain or river water, to enhance the production of agricultural crops.
In coastal and environmental engineering, the closure of tidal inlets entails the deliberate prevention of the entry of seawater into inland areas through the use of fill material and the construction of barriers. The aim of such closures is usually to safeguard inland regions from flooding, thereby protecting ecological integrity and reducing potential harm to human settlements and agricultural areas.
