studies of rainfall variation generally focus on large areas. for example, in india, the area average monsoon rainfall series of the whole country or meteorological subdivisions are used. this would be of no use for local agriculture, particularly in places where rainfall is very high or very low, especially for crops like small cardamom and vanilla which are very sensitive to soil moisture and...

As commonly defined, the tropics comprise that region of the earth lying between the Tropics of Cancer and Capricorn, constituting 38% of the larid surface (5 x 109 ha). The tropics may also be defined as those areas with mean temperatures greater than 18'C in all mor.ths of th. year. A third definition of the tropics specifies those areas with soils in which the tempera­ ture at a depth of 50 ...

this study was conducted using one hundred and eighty (180) day-old broiler chicks, of anak strain to assess the levels of inclusion of indomie waste meal as a substitute for maize at 0, 25, 50, 75 and 100%. the birds were randomly assigned to dietary treatments using completely randomized design (crd). each treatment contained 3 replicates and each replicate had 6 birds. the study lasted for e...

Flood simulation and forecasting in various types of watersheds is a hot issue in hydrology. Conceptual hydrological models have been widely applied to flood forecasting for decades. With the development of economy, modern China faces with severe flood disasters in all types of watersheds include humid, semi-humid semi-arid and arid watersheds. However, conceptual model-based flood forecasting ...

Knowledge about the long-term influences of climate change on the amount of potential carbon (C) sequestration in forest ecosystems, including age-related dynamics, remains unclear. This study used two similar age-sequences of black locust forests (Robinia pseudoacacia L.) in the semi-arid and semi-humid zones of China's Loess Plateau to assess the variation in C stocks and age-related dynamics...

[1] The enhancement of infiltration capacity in the presence of vegetation is well documented in arid ecosystems where it can significantly impact the water balance and vegetation spatial organization. To begin progress toward developing a theory of vegetation‐infiltration interactions across a wide spectrum of climate regimes, three key questions are addressed: (1) Does vegetation also enhance...

655 Fresh water is under pressure in the humid tropics from population growth, land use and climate change, all of which are influenced by humans. These pressures are likely to have profound consequences. Here we present a research vision for the humid tropics as an outcome of a community workshop held in Hawaii in March 2011. This report includes various perspectives from the international sci...

For many horticultural crops, selection is based on quality as well as yield. To investigate the distribution of trait variation and identify those attributes appropriate for developing selection indices, we collected and organized information related to fruit size, shape, color, soluble solids, acid, and yield traits for 143 processing tomato (Solanum lycopersicum L.) lines from North America....