PERMANENT AND TEMPORARY WILTING POINT

PERMANENT AND TEMPORARY WILTING POINT

History

  • Lyman Briggs and Homer LeRoy Shantz (1912) proposed the wilting coefficient.
  • It is defined as the percentage water content of a soil when the plants growing in that soil are first reduced to a wilted condition from which they cannot recover in approximately saturated atmosphere without the addition of water to the soil.

Permanent Wilting Point

It is defined as the minimum amount of water in the soil that the plant requires not to wilt. If the soil water content decreases to this point, a plant wilts and can no longer recover its turgidity when placed in a saturated atmosphere for 12 hours.

  • Here permanent loss of turgidity in cells. 
  • PWP happens when rate of transpiration is more than the rate of water supply below critical level.
  • Wilting does not disappear even after water supply resumes to normal.
  • Plants eventually die.

Temporary Wilting Point

Wilting that occurs in hot weather when the rate of transpiration exceeds the rate at which a plant can absorb moisture from the soil. The plant recovers when the temperature falls.

  • Here temporary loss of turgidity in cells.
  • This happens when rate of transpiration is more than the rate of water supply.
  • Wilting disappears as soon as water supply resumes to normal, and Plant recovers its normal activity.

Read also…
SOIL WATER- CLASSES AND AVAILABILITY
SOIL CONSISTENCY- MEANING, MEASURE AND ATTERBERG LIMIT
NITRIFICATION AND DENITRIFICATION
NITROGEN CYCLE- DEFINITION, PROCESS & IMPORTANCE
Acidic, Saline and Alkaline Soil
Cation Exchange Capacity & Buffering Capacity
SOIL FERTILITY AND PRODUCTIVITY
DIFFERENCE BETWEEN INFILTRATION PERCOLATION AND SEEPAGE

 

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