Due to the intensive utilization of water for irrigation and the high costs of this resource, irrigation systems need to run with high levels of efficiency. The spatial pattern of soil properties can help to improve the efficiency of irrigation management. For this, geostatistic techniques are needed. The objectives of this work were to describe statistically and to evaluate the spatial variability of bulk density, soil porosity and water storage, on a Red Nitosols, cultivated with irrigated beans. The experimental area was sub-divided into 80 squares, in a 3 m squared grid. On each square measurements of soil moisture during the dry cycle, with 0.20 m of depth TDR probes and an undisturbed soil sample were taken. Data was analyzed by descriptive statistics, exploratory analysis and geostatistic techniques. It was found that the total porosity, macroporosity and microporosity are randomly distributed variables. Soil bulk density presented a moderated level of spatial dependence. The uniformity of the amount of water applied does not influence the water storage pattern, but intrinsic soil factors are determining factors.
spatial distribution; geostatistic; soil water storage; soil porosity; soil bulk density
