Foliage temperature as a means of detecting stress of cotton subjected to a short-termwater-table gradient

Reicosky, D.C., Smith, R.C.G. and Meyer, W.S., 1985. Foliage temperature as a means of detecting stress of cotton subjected to a short-term water-table gradient. Agric. For. Meteorol., 35: 193--203. Quantifying crop stress resulting from both excess and deficit water is essential to higher water use efficiencies under flood irrigation. Our objective was to measure foliage temperature as an indicator of plant stress under various levels of waterlogging. Cotton (Gossypsium hirsutum) was grown in a water-table gradient facility and when a com-plete canopy had developed was subjected to 8 days of flooding. The water table gradient facility ensured that a continuum of water-table conditions ranging from complete inundation to a complete absence in the root zone was established. The foliage tempera-ture, measured around solar noon with a hand-held infrared thermometer, and micro-climate data from a nearby weather station were used to calculate evapotranspiration rates. The foliage temperature of plants with more than 60 % of their root system inun-dated increased slightly relative to air temperature after 4 days of flooding althoug