ET Data

NWREC - Colby ET Data

SWREC - Garden City ET Data

What is ET Data?

Evapotranspiration data can be valuable whether you're irrigating corn or watering your bluegrass lawn. Evapotranspiration is a term that was coined to describe the water use of growing crops. It might be easier to think of it in terms of two-component words--evaporation and transpiration. Often, evapotranspiration is abbreviated as ET.

The amount of ET varies with climatic factors, farming practices, crop growth stage and other factors. ET for a well-watered corn crop in northwestern Kansas can range from 17 to 27 inches per year due to annual climatic differences. Precipitation can also vary widely from year-to-year and is often not uniformly distributed across the growing season as needed. These climatic variations underscore the need to schedule irrigation according to crop needs.

While all this may sound complicated, the procedure for irrigation scheduling is actually quite simple. The scheduling procedure is just like balancing a checkbook. The withdrawals are the ET values. Deposits are rainfall and/or irrigation amounts. The balance is the amount of water remaining in the soil. Irrigation scheduling publications are available from your local county extension office. They will provide a step-by-step procedure for setting up your water budget account.

Farmers and homeowners alike can benefit from irrigation scheduling using ET values. Evapotranspiration may be a mouthful to say, but don't let that prevent you from taking a bite out of your irrigation water usage. Irrigation scheduling software is available at the Kansas Mobile Irrigation Lab.

General Information for Using ET