• Journal of the Korean association of regional geographers
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• v.2 no.1
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• pp.51-67
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• 1996

There are three main rice-growing regions in the United States: the prairie region along the Mississippi River Valley in eastern Arkansas; the Gulf Coast prairie region in southwestern Louisiana and southeastern Texas; and the Central Valley of California. The Central Valley of California is producing about 23% of the US rice(Fig. 1). In California. most of the crop has been produced in the Colusa, Sutter, Butte, Glenn Counties of the Sacramento Valley since 1912, when rice was commercially grown for the first time in the state(Fig. 2). Roughly speaking, the average annual area sown to rice in California is about 300,000 acres to 400,000 acres during the last forty years(Fig. 3). California rice is grown under a Mediterranean climate characterized by warm, dry, clear days, and a long growing season favorable to high photosynthetic rates and high rice yields. The average rice yield per acre is probably higher in California than in any other rice-growing regions of the world(Fig. 4). A dependable supply of irrigation water must be available for a successful rice culture. Most of the irrigation water for California rice comes from the winter rain and snow-fed reservoir of the Sierra Nevada mountain ranges. Less than 10 percent of rice irrigation water is pumped from wells in areas where surface water is not sufficient. It is also essential to have good surface drainage if maximum yields are to be produced. Rice production in California is highly mechanized, requiring only about four hours of labor per acre. Mechanization of rice culture in California includes laser-leveler technology, large tractors, self-propelled combines for harvesting, and aircraft for seeding, pest control, and some fertilization. The principal varieties grown in California are medium-grain japonica types with origins from the cooler rice climates of the northern latitudes (Table 1). Long-grain varieties grown in the American South are not well adapted to California's cooler environment. Nearly all the rice grown recently in California are improved into semidwarf varieties. Choice of variety depends on environment, planting date, quality desired, marketing, and harvesting scheduling. The Rice Experiment Station at Biggs is owned, financed, and administered by the rice industry. The station was established in 1912, as a direct result of the foresight and effort of Charles Edward Chambliss of the United States Department of Agriculture. Now, The station's major effort is the development of improved rice varieties for California.

• Korean Journal of Agricultural and Forest Meteorology
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• v.1 no.1
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• pp.41-51
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• 1999

This study was conducted to investigate the effects of local climatic conditions on the annual increment of Korean white pine planted in Gapyung and Yaungdong. For this, stand variables such as mean DBH, mean height, basal area per hectare, and volume per hectare by stand age were measured and summarized for each locality. Based on these statistics, annual increments for 8 years from stand age 10 to 18 were calculated for each of stand variables. A topoclimatological technique which makes use of empirical relationships between the topography and the weather in study sites was applied to produce normal estimates of monthly mean, maximum, minimum temperatures, relative humidity, precipitation, and hours of sunshine. Then, the yearly climatic variables from 1990 to 1997 for each study site were derived from the spatial interpolation procedures based on inverse- distance weighting of the observed deviation from the climatic normals at the nearest 11 standard weather stations. From these estimates, 17 weather variables such as warmth index, coldness index, index of aridity etc., which affect the tree growth, were computed on yearly base for each locality. The deviations of measured annual increments from the expected annual increments for 8 years based on yield table of Korean white pine were then correlated with and regressed on the yearly weather variables to examine effects of local climatic conditions on the growth. Gapyung area provides better conditions for the growth of Korean white pine in the early stage than Youngdong area. This indicates that the conditions such as low temperature, high relative humidity, and large amount of precipitation provide favor environment for the early growth of Korean white pine. A ccording to the correlation and regression an analysis using local climatic conditions and annual increments, the growth pattern of Gapyung area corresponds to this tendency. However, it was found that the relationship between annual increments and local climatic conditions in Youngdong area shows different tendency from Gapyung. These results mean that the yearly growth pattern could not sufficiently be explained by climatic conditions with high variance in yearly weather variables. In addition, the poor growth in Youngdong area might not only be affected by climatic conditions, but also by other environmental factors such as site quality.

• Korean Journal of Soil Science and Fertilizer
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• v.43 no.6
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• pp.804-811
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• 2010

The lower portion of sloping paddy fields normally contains excessive moisture and the higher water table caused by the inflow of ground water from the upper part of the field resulting in non-uniform water content distribution. Four drainage methods namely Open Ditch, Vinyl Barrier, Pipe Drainage and Tube Bundle for multiple land use were installed within 1-m position from the lower edge of the upper embankment of sloping alluvial paddy fields. Knowledge of the spatial variability of soil water properties is of primary importance for management of agricultural lands. This study was conducted to evaluate the effect of drainage in the soil on spatial variability of soil water content using the geostatistical analysis. The soil water content was collected by a TDR (Time Domain Reflectometry) sensor after the installation of subsurface drainage on regular square grid of 80 m at 20 m paddy field located at Oesan-ri, Buk-myeon, Changwon-si in alluvial slopping paddy fields ($35^{\circ}22^{\prime}$ N, $128^{\circ}35^{\prime}$). In order to obtain the most accurate field information, the sampling grid was divided 3 m by 3 m unit mesh by four drainage types. The results showed that spatial variance of soil water content by subsurface drainage was reduced, though yield of soybean showed the same trends. Value of "sill" of soil water content with semivariogram was 9.7 in Pipe Drainage, 86.2 in Open Ditch, and 66.8 in Vinyl Barrier and 15.7 in Tube Bundle.

• Magazine of the Korean Society of Agricultural Engineers
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• v.13 no.1
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• pp.2191-2205
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• 1971

In this research, Nong-rim No. 6 was adopted as a test variety of rice. Rice seedlings were transplanted on June 14, 1970. Roots were settled into soil on June 20 and a total number of days irrigated of $21cm{\times}21cm$ and an area of $9.9m^2$ for a test plot were accepted, planting 70 stumps of rice in a test plot. The soil in test plots are classified by soil test as oam, and its chemical contents are as shown in Table 3. Irrigation water was secured by pumping from the Sudun stream that originates at the Suho reservoir. Accordingly, the qualities of irrigation. water are considered to be the same as those of water stored in the Suho reservoir. There were 54 days of intermittent rainfalls in total during the whole 110-day period of irrigation. As a result, it is likely that the growth of rice plants was influenced by rainfall at a comparatively great degree. In order to measure the amounts of water consumption, infiltrometers, measuring devices for the decreases of water depths and lycimeters were provided. As a result of measurements, an average daily rate of infiltration was observed to be 14mm/day. It is expected from this research that the effect of increased yield will be secured by supplying optimum amounts of water for irrigation on proper times, and that the amounts of water consumption for irrigation can be saved by applying suitable irrigation methods. The test results obtained are summarized as follows: 1. Yields produced in the test plots of continuous irrigation are lower than those in the test plots of rotational irrigation, i.e., yields produced at the test plots irrigatied once in a period of 8 days are higher by 27% in average than those produced at test plots of continuous irrigation. 2. The amounts of irrigation water for test plots, which have a clay layer of 9cm in thickness and vynil diaphragm without holes, are saved by about 52% in comparison with ordinary test plots. 3. Ears are sprouted 5 days earlier at continuous irrigation plots as compared with other test plots. 4. It seems that there are growing stages of rice plants such as those of forming and sprouting of ears, in which the amounts of irrigation water are consumed more in comparison with the other stages. Therefore, it may be possible to increase of decrease the amount of irrigation water, according to the growing stage of rice plant, so as to save irrigation water.