Trade-offs among pear yield, fruit quality, and reactive nitrogen losses under water-nitrogen management across...

Water-nitrogen (N) management is important for sustaining orchard productivity while reducing environmental N losses, but its integrated effects on pear production, fruit quality, and reactive N losses across contrasting soil textures remain insufficiently understood. A two-year cultivation-pool experiment was conducted using 'Huangguan' pear under clay, sandy, and loam soils. Four water-N treatments were established: F_HW_H (180 kg N ha^-1 + 100% irrigation), F_HW_L (180 kg N ha^-1 + 50% irrigation), F_LW_H (70 kg N ha^-1 + 100% irrigation), and F_LW_L (70 kg N ha^-1 + 50% irrigation). F_LW_H produced the highest average fruit yield across the three soil textures, with yield and the comprehensive fruit quality index comparable to F_HW_H but higher than water-deficit treatments. Reduced-N treatments decreased ammonia (NH₃) volatilization and nitrous oxide (N₂O) emissions compared with high-N treatments. Soil texture further regulated reactive N losses, with loam soil showing higher cumulative NH₃ volatilization and N₂O emissions than clay and sandy soils. The calculated production-environment indicators further showed that F_LW_H improved partial factor productivity of N and reduced both total reactive N loss and yield-scaled reactive N loss. These results indicate that full irrigation can partly compensate for yield reductions under reduced N input, maintain overall fruit quality, and lower gaseous reactive N losses, although loss magnitude varied among soil textures. Overall, reduced N with full irrigation is a promising strategy for balancing pear production performance and environmental N losses under controlled cultivation-pool conditions, but soil texture should be considered before broader application to commercial orchards.