Petr Fučík

Pesticide leaching by agricultural drainage in sloping, mid-textured soil conditions – the role of runoff components

Dynamics of pesticides and their metabolites in drainage waters during baseflow periods and rainfall-runoff events (RREs) were studied from 2014 to 2016 at three small, tile-drained agricultural catchments in Bohemian-Moravian Highlands, Czech Republic. Drainage systems in this region are typically built in slopes with considerable proportion of drainage runoff originating outside the drained area itself. Continuous monitoring was performed by automated samplers, and the event hydrograph was separated using 18O and 2H isotopes and drainage water temperature. Results showed that drainage systems represent a significant source for pesticides leaching from agricultural land. Leaching of pesticide metabolites was mainly associated with baseflow and shallow interflow. Water from causal precipitation diluted their concentrations. The prerequisites for the leaching of parental compounds were a rainfall-runoff event occurring shortly after spraying, and the presence of event water in the runoff. When such situations happened consequently, pesticides concentrations in drainage water were high and the pesticide load reached several grams in a few hours. Presented results introduce new insights into the processes of pesticides movement in small, tile-drained catchments and emphasizes the need to incorporate drainage hydrology and flow-triggered sampling into monitoring programmes in larger catchments as well as in environment-conservation policy.

Assessment of runoff nitrogen load reduction measures for agricultural catchments

Abstract Water quality in rural catchments is influenced by many societal and bio-physical factors (e.g. different pollution sources, land use and land cover changes). Good ecological status and surface water quality are currently challenged mainly due to different poorly identified pollution sources. The main objective of this study is to estimate the potential of different measures (land use changes and/or reduction in point sources) and their combinations in decreasing the nitrate-nitrogen load from Jankovský stream catchment. The eco-hydrological model SWIM, which simulates dynamics of nutrients in a catchment was used in the study. The simulations for scenario measures showed that nitrate-nitrogen loads at the outlet can be decreased more by reduction of municipal nitrate-nitrogen sources rather than by agricultural land-use change. Overall, the modeling results demonstrated that the most effective scenario was the combination of total reduction of municipal nitrate-nitrogen sources and agricultural land-use change.