Field-scale nutrient transport monitoring and modeling of subsurface and naturally drained agricultural lands

Eutrophication impacts the quality of many surface waters worldwide. Algal blooms threaten lake water quality and in order to control their growth, understanding of nutrient transport at the field-scale is essential. In order to accomplish this, a combination of field monitoring and computer modeling with the SWAT model was undertaken.;SWAT, a watershed-scale model was calibrated with over 6 site years of data, in an attempt to simulate hydrology and pollutant transport at the field-scale. After calibration, the monthly Nash-Sutcliffe Efficiency varied from 0.09 to 0.74 for total drainage; 0.04 to 0.71 for sediment loading; 0.29 to 0.48 for nitrate loads and 0.28 to 0.64 for total phosphorus loads. Overall, SWAT has shown that it has the ability to simulate long-term sediment and nutrient transport at the field-scale. This makes SWAT a valuable tool for the development and evaluation of various beneficial management practices which control sediment and nutrient loss from agricultural fields.;Four sites located in the Pike River watershed of southern Quebec were instrumented to monitor nutrient losses from both clay loam and sandy loam soils under both subsurface and naturally drained conditions. Results illustrate how the presence of subsurface drainage influences phosphorus loss depending on soil texture and structure. Total phosphorus loss from the clay loam subsurface drained site was 4.0 kg ha-1, 55% greater than the naturally drained clay loam site. Total phosphorus loss from the sandy loam subsurface drained site was 1.2 kg ha-1, 14% less than the naturally drained sandy loam site. Total phosphorus losses from the subsurface drainage systems in the clay loam field and the sandy loam field were 2.3 and 0.4 kg ha-1, respectively. Particulate phosphorus was the dominant (78%) form of phosphorus loss from the subsurface drainage system at the clay loam site. This indicates that bypass flow through the soil profile in the clay loam field led to excessive total phosphorus loss.