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OOS-18: Ecological guidelines for management of water quantity and quality in
agricultural landscapes
Tuesday,
August 9, 8 AM - 11:30 AM, Meeting Room 516c, Level 5, Palais
des congrès de Montréal
Organizers:
Lech Ryszkowski (ryszagro@man.poznan.pl),
Richard Lowrance
Description:
The
goal of the session is to discuss the options for management of water fluxes as
well as for control of water quality. Shortage of water, diffuse pollution of
ground and surface water reservoirs are observed worldwide. Elimination of
agriculturally non-productive components of the landscape, soil degradations,
and other deteriorations of countryside result in lowering water storage and it
pollution what undermines productivity of farms, especially small ones in
developing countries. Besides existing technical measures for water management,
new options are provided by the recent advances in landscape ecology. Inducing
structural changes in plant cover of landscape by, for example, introduction of
mid-field rows of trees (shelterbelts), one can influence not only
evapotranspiration rates, but also surface runoff and water infiltration through
soil profiles and therefore change water fluxes in the landscape. Water being a
good solvent of many chemical compounds is a vehicle for distribution of many
pollutants. The recognition of landscape elements influencing hydrology,
therefore, has uttermost meaning for control of spreading waterborne pollution.
The landscape ecology finding that structuring agricultural landscapes with
shelterbelts, strips of grasslands, small mid-field wetlands and water
reservoirs, riparian vegetation strips beside impacts on water cycling enhance,
technical and agrotechnical measures for cleansing water resources has practical
importance. Thus advances in landscape ecology provide new insights for
management of water resources that were not recognized until quite lately in
traditional hydrology.
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