ABSTRACT
Population growth and water concerns are creating an increased need to better understand water use by all plants, including turfgrasses. Lysimeters, which are often used in water-use studies, are containers of soil representing the field environment used to determine the evapotranspiration (ET) of a growing crop or evaporation from bare soil [1]. ET can be estimated using lysimeters, which allow for direct calculation of mass changes due to plant water uptake and soil evaporation [22]. A wide range of lysimeters have been documented in the literature, however there is currently no standard for lysimeter design in turfgrass studies, and consequently, a wide variety of styles and sizes have been used [5]. Lysimeters may be round, square or rectangular, constructed from concrete, steel, fiberglass or plastic, and range in size from 50 mm to 2 m in diameter and from 0.4 to 2 m deep [20].
