Principles of Soil and Plant Water Relations

Principles of Soil and Plant Water Relations combines biology and physics to show how water moves through the soil-plant-atmosphere continuum. This text explores the instrumentation and the methods used to measure the status of water in soil and plants. Principles are clearly presented with the aid of diagrams, anatomical figures, and images of instrumentation. The methods on instrumentation can be used by researchers, consultants, and the military to monitor soil degradation, including measurements of soil compaction, repellency, oxygen diffusion rate, and unsaturated hydraulic conductivity.Intended for graduate students in plant and soil science programs, this book also serves as a useful reference for agronomists, plant ecologists, and agricultural engineers.

"Unique in various ways, and above all is a pleasure to read or browse through. Each chapter contains plenty of references and has extraordinary detail, as one might expect from Mary Beth Kirkham. Unlike most other textbooks Mary Beth devotes many chapters solely to specific instrumentation, including chapters on tensiometry, soil penetrometers, soil oxygen diffusion rate, tension infiltrometry, time domain reflectometry, psychrometry, pressure chambers, and infared thermometers...the author presents thorough explanations based on physical principles that are intuitive, clear, and refreshing. The care exercised by Mary Beth in writing and reviewing this material is exemplified by the fact that I could not find a single error, either in the typesetting or in the scientific contents...an excellent text for an introduction in soil-water-plant relations. I also find it an extremely valuable reference for my own library because of the supplementary material that I usually cannot find in other related textbooks. I would highly recommend it for students and professionals alike."—Jan W. Hopmans, University of California, Davis

"The sheer magnitude of this book's subject matter could overwhelm many readers, but Dr. Kirkham spares us this fate by virtue of superb organization, foundation building, and clear, example-rich writing...I am pleased to recommend this book to students and scientists at any level who profess interest in soil-water science or plant-water relations, and to dendrochronologists or environmental botanists who investigate the effects of water stresses upon tree growth and structure. It would serve as an excellent text for a graduate or advanced undergraduate course, as well, and indeed I expect it to become the standard for this purpose. I would gladly spend my own money for this book, which today joins other timely references on the lowest shelf of my bookcase, within arm's reach."—T.M. Yanosky, U.S. Geological Survey, in JOURNAL OF ENVIRONMENTAL QUALITY, VOL. 34, AUG. 2005

"[Kirkham's] writing style is a beautiful blend of the formal and the familiar, resulting in the feeling that you are not so much reading the text, as seeing the seminar on which the text was based...I enjoyed reading this unique book because it assembled many important aspects of water relations into one concise format. Kirkham guides you on a journey of discovery (or in my case re-discovery) of the principles underlying the concepts and practices of plant and soil water relations. Her book provides perfect foundation for university courses on the soil-plant-atmosphere continuum...Kirkham's book is a powerful reference tool for plant and soil scientists alike. Keep this book on your desk so that you can present it to the next plant breeder who walks into your office asking for help to develop a simple test for screening drought tolerance in plants."—Malcom J. Morrison, Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, ECORC, in Agriculture Ecosystems Environment