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Abstract
Muddy Creek is a small agricultural watershed located in Essex County, in the southwestern part of Ontario between Lake Erie and Lake St. Clair. Muddy Creek delivers runoff to Wheatley Harbour, which is identified as one of the Areas of Concern (AOC). Sediments and nutrients from agricultural runoff have been identified as environmental concerns in Wheatley Harbour. In this study, the Annualized AGricultural NonPoint Source (AnnAGNPS) model was used to estimate the loadings and their contributing areas of surface runoff, sediment and nutrients from Muddy Creek watershed. Simulated runoff volume is found to be within the acceptable limit and the sediment loading is fairly comparable to the loadings produced from the watersheds with similar nature found in the literature.
Due to lack of observed data, the model could not be calibrated. However, a sensitivity analysis is performed to increase the confidence in model predictions and to improve the understanding of the model behaviour. Sensitivity analysis showed that sediment yield is highly sensitive to the scale of cell discretization.
