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Field experiments were conducted during two successive growing seasons ( 2017/2018 and 2018/2019) in Guava orchard at Kafr Al Dawar district, Beheira Governorate, Egypt, to investigate the effect of water regime levels: 100% (E1), 80% (E2) and 60% (E3) of crop evapotranspiration (ETc) under two irrigation systems: furrow irrigation (I1) and surface drip irrigation (I2) on water use efficiency, growth parameters, yield components, and economic analysis of four years old guava trees grown in clay soil. The field experiments were implemented in arandomized complete block design with three replicates.  The obtained results indicated that the highest shoot length, number of leaves/m and leaf area were obtained due to T2E1 treatment (drip irrigation with 100% ETc), followed by I2E2 treatment (drip irrigation with 80 % ETc). The average highest guava yield of the two growing seasons was 26.64 tons/ha which was obtained as a result of I2E1 treatment (drip irrigation with 100% of ETc). The lowest guava yield (20.24 and 17.90 tons/ha) were obtained due to I1E3 treatment (furrow irrigation with 60% of ETc) for the two growing seasons, respectively. Yield components such as number of fruits/m, length of fruit (cm), diameter of fruit (cm), fruit size (cm³), fruit weight (gm.) and yield (kg/tree) were significantly effected (P˂ 0.05)  by water regime levels and irrigation systems. Water use efficiency (WUE) of drip-irrigated treatments was higher than that obtained from furrow irrigated treatments in the two growing seasons. WUE increased from 2.37 to 3.34 kg.m-3 for drip - irrigated treatment, and from 1.63 to 2.18 kg.m-3 for furrow -irrigated treatments.  Fruit quality such as TSS (%), acidity (%) and TSS / Acidity ratio were not significantly affected by irrigation systems and water regime. For the economical results, the maximum value of net return was due to I2E1(24411 LE/fed)treatment for the two growing seasons and the minimum value of total return was the result of T1E3 (6344 LE/fed)treatment for the two growing seasons. The maximum values of water productivity were obtained under T2E1 (5.56 LE/m³) and I2E2 (5.25 LE/m³)  treatments in the two growing seasons. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Two field experiments were carried out on Jerusalem artichoke crop during two successive seasons of 2016 and 2017 at Soil Salinity Laboratory Research, Agricultural Research Center, Alexandria Governorate, Egypt. Each experiment included sixteen treatments representing the combination of two types of soils; i.e., clay and calcareous, two trimming treatments; i.e., without trimming (T0) and trimming (T1) [removing of flowering buds before opening with 10-20 cm from ends of vegetative branches], and four fertilization treatments; i.e., 75 kg nitrogen/feddan + Halex-2 (F1), 75 kg nitrogen/feddan + yeast extract (F2), 75 kg nitrogen/feddan + Halex-2 + yeast extract (F3) and 100 kg nitrogen/feddan (F4). The experimental layout was presented as a split-split-plot in a randomized complete blocks design with three replicates. Two types of soil were assigned in the main plots; two trimming treatments were allocated to the sub-plots and four fertilization treatments which were, randomly, distributed in the sub-sub-plots. Planting Jerusalem artichoke tubers in clay soil encouraged each of the vegetative growth, yield and its component characters compared to planting in calcareous soil. Un-trimming Jerusalem artichoke growing plants resulted in positive effects on the vegetative characters, tubers' yield and its components traits compared to trimming treatment. Adding moderate amount of nitrogen fertilizer (75 kg N/ fed.) combined with Halex-2 plus yeast extract yielded statistically equal results if 100 kg N/fed. was added to the growing plants for most studied characters especially the economic ones. Maturity date trait did not affect with any of the applied treatments on Jerusalem artichoke growing plants. It turned out from the obtained results that a quarter of nitrogen fertilizer quantity could be saved by adding a mixture of biostimulants (Halex-2 + yeast extract) to the growing plants, in addition to un-trimming the ends of branching whether the cultivation was in clay or calcareous soils. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]