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| Submitter's Name |
Sagarika Rath |
| Session Name |
Poster Session - Agricultural/Silvicultural Water |
| Poster Number |
8 |
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| Author(s) |
Sagarika Rath, PhD student (Presenting Author) |
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Maria Zamora,
PhD student |
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Wendy Graham, Director UF Water Institute |
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Comparison of SWAT and DSSAT predictions of BMP effectiveness to reduce field scale Nitrogen leaching |
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Nitrate leaching to groundwater beneath agricultural lands is a major issue in north-central Florida. Development and implementation of innovative Best Management Practices (BMPs) such as improved water and nitrogen management, use of cover crops and implementation of less intensive crop rotations are required to address this problem. Field experiments and computer modeling of potential BMPs need to be conducted to assess the expected reduction in nitrogen loads of alternative practices and to design effective BMP adoption incentive programs. The objective of this study was to evaluate the ability of the SWAT and DSSAT models to simulate a corn-peanut rotation BMP field experiment conducted at the Suwannee Valley Agricultural Extension Center in Live Oak Florida. Results from field scale simulations will ultimately be used to build confidence in the use of these models to predict watershed scale impacts of alternative BMP adoption scenarios. Preliminary results show that both SWAT and DSSAT produce reasonable predictions for corn and peanut yield, biomass, N uptake and soil water and nitrogen dynamics. Results showed that the predicted and observed corn yields were similar for the high (336kg/ha) and medium N (246 kg/ha) application rates, but that simulated nitrate leaching for the medium application rate was significantly lower. The use of cover crops during the fallow season reduced simulated nitrogen leaching by 20-40%. |
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