Hydrological pathways and nitrogen runoff in agricultural dominated catchments in Nordic and Baltic countries

Deelstra, Johannes; Iital, Arvo; Povilaitis, Arvydas; Kyllmar, Katarina; Greipsland, Inga; Blicher-Mathiesen, Gitte; Jansons, Viesturs; Koskiaho, Jari; Lagzdiņš, Ainis

doi:10.1016/j.agee.2014.06.007

Cited by 33 publications

(29 citation statements)

References 26 publications

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“…The Spearman's rank correlation analysis showed statistically significant and strong positive correlation between annual run-off and annual TN (R = 0.72) and TP (R = 0.85) loss for the Berze site, while in the Mellupite a substantially weaker relation was found (Table 4). A positive relation between run-off and nitrogen loss for the Norwegian and Swedish agricultural catchments was reported by Deelstra et al (2014), and similar findings for Danish and Estonian catchments were made by Stålnacke et al (2014). A study by Deelstra et al (2011) indicated that variation in TP loss corresponded to the variation in run-off.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 79%

“…Moreover, studies have shown that the share of arable land in the catchment area has a positive correlation with N concentrations and losses in stream water (Jansons et al 2003;Iital et al 2005;Kyllmar et al 2006). Deelstra and Iital (2008) and Deelstra et al (2014) concluded that hydrological behaviour can vary significantly among the agricultural catchments mainly due to the differences in topography, subsurface drainage intensity, and soils. These studies also showed a positive relation between run-off and nitrogen losses.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 97%

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Nutrient losses from subsurface drainage systems in Latvia

Lagzdiņš

Jansons

Sudars

et al. 2015

Acta Agriculturae Scandinavica, Section B — Soil & Plant Sc

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Artificial subsurface drainage systems are a common water management practice to remove excess water from agricultural land in the Baltic and Nordic countries. Unfortunately, these systems also serve as nutrient transport pathways from agricultural fields to downstream waterbodies. The objective of this study was to determine the status of subsurface drainage water in the context of implementation of the European Union (EU) Water Framework Directive (WFD) and EU Nitrate Directive (ND), to investigate the impact of hydrology and mineral fertilizer application on nutrient losses through subsurface drainage systems and to evaluate the possible effects of climate change on drainage and nutrient loss. This research was conducted from 1995 through 2013 at the agricultural run-off-monitoring sites in Berze and Mellupite. Continuous-flow measurement data and composite water samples were collected on a monthly basis for assessment of total nitrogen (TN), nitrate-nitrogen (NO 3 -N) and total phosphorus (TP) in drainage water. Results from the study indicated that the mean annual NO 3 -N concentration was slightly below the threshold level defined by ND, while TN concentrations exceeded the threshold level for good chemical status of water according to WFD. Differences in TN losses were mainly driven by the hydrologic behaviour at the study sites rather than by mineral fertilizer application rates, whereas TP losses under similar application rates were affected by open inlets for surface water accumulation. The comparison of meteorological data for the research period (1995)(1996)(1997)(1998)(1999)(2000)(2001)(2002)(2003)(2004)(2005)(2006)(2007)(2008)(2009)(2010)(2011)(2012)(2013) with the long-term mean showed a pronounced evidence of climate change. The mean annual precipitation amount has increased at both Berze and Mellupite monitoring sites by 36 mm and 42 mm, respectively, compared to the long-term mean for 1950-1994. Meanwhile, the mean annual temperature during the research period was 7.3°C for Berze and 6.4°C for Mellupite, which is 1.4°C and 0.6°C warmer than longterm mean.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 79%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 97%

Nutrient losses from subsurface drainage systems in Latvia

Lagzdiņš

Jansons

Sudars

et al. 2015

Acta Agriculturae Scandinavica, Section B — Soil & Plant Sc

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“…In contrast, the Uruguayan streams exhibited a much higher contribution of stormflow to total flow and higher flashiness (R-B index = 0.9-1.3), reflecting the local climate and likely also soil conditions. As a reference, reported data in the literature include daily maximum values of the R-B index reaching 0.43 in mountain streams in Slovakia and Austria (Holko et al, 2011), 0.65 in 30 agriculturally dominated catchments in seven Nordic and Baltic countries (Deelstra et al, 2014), 1.01 at 204 stations in Michigan temperate streams (USA) (Fongers, 2012), and 1.32 at 515 stations in catchments located in six US Midwestern States (Baker et al, 2004).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Irrespective of the hydrological nature of the catchments, nutrient monitoring programs are frequently based on lowfrequency sampling at discrete intervals. This kind of sampling strategy complemented by interpolation methods is prone to very high uncertainties due to typical underrepresentation of high-discharge, short-duration events (Defew et al, 2013;Jones et al, 2012;Jordan and Cassidy, 2011;Stelzer and Likens, 2006). A priori, the risk of missing the key moments when phosphorus is delivered to the streams is higher in flashy streams than in hydrologically stable ones.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Monitoring strategies of stream phosphorus under contrasting climate-driven flow regimes

Goyenola

Meerhoff

Mello

et al. 2015

Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci.

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Climate and hydrology are relevant control factors determining the timing and amount of nutrient losses from land to downstream aquatic systems, in particular of phosphorus (P) from agricultural lands. The main objective of the study was to evaluate the differences in P export patterns and the performance of alternative monitoring strategies in streams under contrasting climate-driven flow regimes. We compared a set of paired streams draining lowland microcatchments under temperate climate and stable discharge conditions (Denmark) and under sub-tropical climate and flashy conditions (Uruguay). We applied two alternative nutrient sampling programs (high-frequency composite sampling and low-frequency instantaneous-grab sampling) and estimated the contribution derived from point and diffuse sources fitting a source apportionment model. We expected to detect a pattern of higher total and particulate phosphorus export from diffuse sources in streams in Uruguay streams, mostly as a consequence of higher variability in flow regime (higher flashiness). Contrarily, we found a higher contribution of dissolved P in flashy streams. We did not find a notably poorer performance of the low-frequency sampling program to estimate P exports in flashy streams compared to the less variable streams. We also found signs of interaction between climate/hydrology and land use intensity, in particular in the presence of point sources of P, leading to a bias towards underestimation of P in hydrologically stable streams and overestimation of P in flashy streams. Based on our findings, we suggest that the evaluation and use of more accurate monitoring methods, such as automatized flow-proportional water samplers and automatized bankside analyzers, should be prioritized whenever logistically possible. However, it seems particularly relevant in currently flashy systems and also in systems where climate change predictions suggest an increase in stream flashiness.Published by Copernicus Publications on behalf of the European Geosciences Union.

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“…[] and Deelstra et al . [] have shown that the watersheds with high flashiness in streamflow have corresponding low BFI. Given that they capture opposing flow processes (fast c.f.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

A synthetic study to evaluate the utility of hydrological signatures for calibrating a base flow separation filter

Peterson

Costelloe

et al. 2016

Water Resources Research

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Estimation of base flow from streamflow hydrographs has been a major challenge in hydrology for decades, leading to developments of base flow separation filters. When without tracer or groundwater data to calibrate the filters, the standard approach to apply these filters in practice involves some degrees of subjectivity in choosing the filter parameters. This paper investigates the use of signature-based calibration in implementing base flow filtering by testing seven possible hydrological signatures of base flow against modeled daily base flow produced by Li et al. (2014) for a range of synthetic catchments simulated with HydroGeoSphere. Our evaluation demonstrates that such a calibration method with few selected signatures as objectives is capable of calibrating a filter-Eckhardt filter-to yield satisfactory base flow estimates at daily, monthly and long-term time scales, outperforming the standard approach. The best performing signatures can be readily derived from streamflow time series. While their performance depends on the catchment characteristics, the catchments where the signature method performs can be distinguished using commonly-used descriptors of flow dynamics.

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Hydrological pathways and nitrogen runoff in agricultural dominated catchments in Nordic and Baltic countries

Cited by 33 publications

References 26 publications

Nutrient losses from subsurface drainage systems in Latvia

Nutrient losses from subsurface drainage systems in Latvia

Monitoring strategies of stream phosphorus under contrasting climate-driven flow regimes

A synthetic study to evaluate the utility of hydrological signatures for calibrating a base flow separation filter

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