Modeling hydrological impacts of management practices in rural catchments using SWAT

Result code in IS VaVaI

<a href="https://www.isvavai.cz/riv?ss=detail&h=RIV%2F68407700%3A21110%2F22%3A00361900" target="_blank" >RIV/68407700:21110/22:00361900 - isvavai.cz</a>

Result on the web

<a href="https://dspace.cvut.cz/bitstream/handle/10467/102671/F1-D-2022-Noreika-Nina%20Elizabeth-FinalThesisNoreika.pdf?sequence=2" target="_blank" >https://dspace.cvut.cz/bitstream/handle/10467/102671/F1-D-2022-Noreika-Nina%20Elizabeth-FinalThesisNoreika.pdf?sequence=2</a>

DOI - Digital Object Identifier

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Result language

angličtina

Original language name

Modeling hydrological impacts of management practices in rural catchments using SWAT

Original language description

Inappropriate soil, water, and landscape management has decreased the water retention capacity of the landscape in the Czech Republic over time. Many sources of such mismanagement can be traced to an agricultural intensification across the Czech landscape that began after the 1953 collectivization process due to Communist Era policies. During this time large monotonous fields, subsurface tile drainage systems, and artificially straightened streams were incorporated across the landscape. Currently, much of the Czech agricultural landscape is managed by large conglomerates who prioritize profit over all else. Reinforcing the small water cycle is considered to be a holistic approach to water resource management within a landscape. Changes in land use and land management can greatly affect the water balance at a basin-scale. The objectives of this research are to calibrate and validate the Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) in the Czech landscape at two scales (the farm-scale and the management-scale) and to model various scenarios (e.g., crop changes, land use/management changes, and the incorporation of agricultural conservation practices) to determine management regimes that would reinforce the small water cycle. This research found that rapeseed adoption does not support the goal of developing a sustainable agricultural landscape in the Czech Republic. The adoption of rapeseed had disproportionate effects on a basin’s water balance depending on its location in the basin. In addition to crop changes, it was found that land use changes significantly affected the small water cycle at the basin-scale. Of the four land use change scenarios conducted (1852, 1954, 1983, and 2019), the 1852 and 1954 scenarios behaved the most similarly hydrologically, likely due to minimal landscape transformation and the fact that these two scenarios occur prior to the widespread incorporation of subsurface tile drainages across the landscape. Additionally, the crop rotation of 1920–1938 (Pre- Communist Era) reinforced the small water cycle the most, while that of 1950–1989 (Communist Era) reinforced the small water cycle the least. Regarding the incorporation of agricultural conservation practices at the farm-scale, SWAT modeled contour farming as the most effective practice that reinforced the small water cycle followed by residue incorporation. At the management-scale, the widespread incorporation of agricultural conservation practices significantly reinforced the small water cycle, but the relative scale and spatial distribution of their incorporation were not reflected in the SWAT scenario analysis.

Czech name

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Czech description

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Type

O - Miscellaneous

CEP classification

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OECD FORD branch

10501 - Hydrology

Project

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Continuities

S - Specificky vyzkum na vysokych skolach

Publication year

2022

Confidentiality

S - Úplné a pravdivé údaje o projektu nepodléhají ochraně podle zvláštních právních předpisů