Performance evaluation of different evaporation retardants in semi arid tropics

The ability of different evaporation retardants in reducing evaporation from water surface bodies was studied in the meteorological observatory. Evaporation reductions were determined directly by measuring the volume of water evaporated from the test recipients after a certain period of time. Results indicate that maize Stover@6 kg sq.m⁻¹ brought a maximum reduction of 4.4 mm day⁻¹ in evaporation followed by burnt oil 2mm thick film (3.15mm day⁻¹) and poly film (4.01mm day⁻¹) and cetyl alcohol@2.2 kg ha⁻¹ (1.25 mm day⁻¹) as against the control (7.79mm day⁻¹).