Landscape Factors Of Nutrient Transport In Temperate Agricultural Catchments

Abstract

The influence of landscape factors on nutrient fluxes is highly variable, depending on which fluxes dominate and vary in the subject catchment. Watersheds where the input is the most variable source, soil qualities, the proportion of certain land uses, proximity to the water body and runoff determine nutrient transport. In catchments, where variation in chemical and physical conduits and barriers determines the flows, the factors of the landscape pattern also explain the differences in nutrient losses. Nitrogen, apart from other nutrients, is better determined by factors of agriculture and the qualities of the soil. Due to the relevance of anaerobic conditions in denitrification, one of the specifically important factors is water regime. It has been proposed that the greatest variance among nitrogen losses occurs in small catchments (<5000ha). Attention to that should help address issues of scale in nutrient transport research. Phosphorus is more strongly connected with physical factors, especially flow conduits and barriers. There is a well established link with the amount of riparian buffers. The proportion of urban land use also has a relatively great influence. Keywords: landscape, spatial, geostatistics, geochemistry, nutrient transport, nutrient losses, nutrient flux, nutrient flow, nitrogen transport, phosphorus transport, catchment, watershed. 1 Introduction In this paper we consider landscape as a geo-system or geo-complex, a comprehensive complex of natural (physical, chemical, biological) and anthropogenic factors distinguished at various hierarchical levels (i.e., micro-, meso-, and macro-chores; see [1-6]). Depending on the degree of human interaction, landscape characteristics can be dominated by natural aspects on the one hand or human management on the other hand. In this paper we consider