The Effects of Irrigation on Land Degradation by Land Division

This study was carried out to determine the effects of irrigation on the land degradation by land division in cultivated lands of Yenisarbademli district, Isparta-Turkey. In the study, some maps of lands and the database which created in another study were used mostly and data were evaluated using the electronic computing tables and some computer programs. Results indicated that total of 8308.7 da cultivated lands consisted of 7251 parcels of which 58.3% had a size smaller than 1.0 da. An average size of these parcels is 1.15 da. Lands were separated into five irrigation groups based on irrigation case and length of irrigated period. There were significant differences in average parcel sizes among the groups (p<0.01). Although, the average parcel sizes of the lands which have been irrigated over 30 years were in the same group, they were in different groups for the lands which have been irrigated for seven years or not under irrigation at all. It was concluded that the degree of land division increased by increment in irrigated period and affected by soil properties related to irrigation.