Abstract:
The current trend in irrigation is to employ automatic operations in the irrigation
system, rather than using the manual operation. Automated irrigation has many
advantages such as saving of water and energy, reduction in labour cost and high
crop yield. Pulse irrigation is an intermittent irrigation strategy based on
discharge pulses followed by breaks and is usually employed in micro irrigation
systems. In this study, sensors to detect soil moisture, atmospheric humidity, and
temperature were used. Arduino is an open-source prototyping platform based on
easy-to-use hardware and software. Arduino hardware is microcontroller-based and
provides a platform for building digital devices and interactive objects that can sense
and control the physical world. Arduino software is an Integrated Development
Environment (IDE) used as a programming interface for the Arduino programming
language. In this study functions/modules were developed in Arduino programming
language for the Arduino micro-controller which acts as a controller incorporating
the data from the different sensors to control on-demand high frequency micro
irrigation. The Arduino micro-controller was integrated to a LCD screen which
displays the status of water available in the soil profile and when irrigation is to be
applied. The Arduino board controls a solenoid valve which is switched on and off
based on the sensor inputs and the irrigation pulses required. It was found that
Arduino can be effectively used for automating pulse irrigation when integrated with
soil moisture sensors and humidity and temperature sensor. The irrigation controller
developed is highly flexible to varying parameters and the whole system can be
easily modified and edited to have a desired system of irrigation.
