Location: Soil and Water Management Research
Project Number: 5062-12130-007-021-S
Project Type: Non-Assistance Cooperative Agreement
Start Date: Sep 1, 2019
End Date: Aug 31, 2020
Objective:
Develop a method to correlate in-stream measurements of nitrate and N2O with land use and conservation practices on adjacent lands.
Approach:
Continuous measurements of nitrate, nitrous oxide, and associated parameters (temperature, pH, dissolved oxygen) will be measured from a kayak as it floats down selected waterways in southeast MN, while GPS readings are simultaneously recorded. The resulting data will be mapped and compared against the output of a watershed model that applies weights to adjacent lands based on crop type, slope, and presence of conservation practices that are obtained from GIS analyses. The weights will then be adjusted in an inverse modeling optimization scheme to determine the relative impact of the different practices and land uses on nitrate losses.
