Abstract:The fresh water resources for irrigation are severely scarce in arid and semi-arid agricultural areas, thus the intensive irrigation with reclaimed water resources and underground saline water resources have become a key issue for sustainable development of regional crop farming. According to the key growth stages of sunflower (seedling-squaring stage, squaring-flowering stage, flowering-maturity stage), three groups of continuous irrigation modes (FFF, SSS, RRR) and six groups of alternate irrigation modes (SSR, SRS, RSS, SRR, RSR, RRS) were set up, with fresh water (F), saline water (S) and reclaimed water (R). Two-year field experiment was carried out in Yinbei Irrigation District of Ningxia to explore the effects of different rotation irrigation modes with reclaimed water and saline water on the plant growth characteristics and grain development characteristics of sunflower. The results indicated that the degree of abiotic stress caused by reclaimed water irrigation at sunflower peak flowering stage was lower than that of irrigation with saline water. At the seedling-flowering stage of sunflower, the saline water irrigation promoted the plant dry matter distribution to roots, while the reclaimed water irrigation promoted the plant dry matter distribution to stems, leaves and faceplates. Reclaimed water irrigation at sunflower seeding-flowering stage can significantly improve the content of crude protein, unsaturated fatty acids and saturated fatty acids in grains. The SRR alternate irrigation mode significantly increased the sunflower grain yield by 2.9%~32.7%, compared with other rotation irrigation modes. While, the water use efficiency for RRS alternate irrigation mode was significantly decreased by 19.9%~28.1%, the nitrogen and phosphorus use efficiency was reduced by 22.4%~38.0%, compared with other rotation irrigation modes. Reclaimed water irrigation from flowering to maturity stage was more conducive to improving sunflower seed yield and water use efficiency than brackish water irrigation. Moreover, in a certain number of years, alternate irrigation with treated reclaimed water and saline water would not lead to excessive accumulation of heavy metal elements in sunflower grains. The research result suggested that the mode of saline water irrigation at seeding-squaring stage and reclaimed water irrigation at squaring-maturity stage could effectively save fresh water, promote sunflower plant growth and improve the grain quality, which could provide reference for the development and utilization of reclaimed water and saline water in water-deficient agricultural areas of Northwest China.