S12 - Session P1 - Dendrometers in orchards to better manage irrigation and water resources in the face of global warming

Authors: Baptiste Labeyrie *

Climate change is causing modifications to water resources : reduced availability in the soil in summer, reduction in summer precipitation accumulations, particularly in the south of France, etc. All this while the combined demands of different actors on this shared resource (agriculture, tourism, industry, housing, etc.) cause tensions at the level of society. The question of efficient water management therefore arises more and more for farms, even in areas where irrigation water is currently available. The DENVER project consists in testing the interest of controlling irrigation with dendrometers, which allow precise measurement of the physiological state of trees, and thus to experiment with these tools in orchard strategies that are more efficient in water. This project brings together major fruit species from the Auvergne Rhone-Alpes region: peach, apple, walnut and chestnut. The aim is to validate technical itineraries allowing savings in water consumption and to deploy them in the territory.