J. Boardman, B. Evans, D. Favis-Mortlock, I. Foster, K. Vandaele
{"title":"Progress in soil erosion research: A European perspective","authors":"J. Boardman, B. Evans, D. Favis-Mortlock, I. Foster, K. Vandaele","doi":"10.2489/jswc.2023.0223A","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2489/jswc.2023.0223A","url":null,"abstract":"M any so-called new developments in soil erosion research are in fact “evolutionary” in character— they are built on research foundations established during past decades. We need look no further than Hugh Hammond Bennett’s (1939) Soil Conservation to realize that we stand on the shoulders of giants. However, the significance of concepts such as “connectivity” has changed as perspectives have shifted during the last 50 years, from the experimental plot and field to the catchment (Boardman et al. 2022). Also, increased technical expertise in computing, geographic information systems (GIS), and remote sensing has certainly opened new possibilities. In this short personal perspective, we aim to review new developments from a European viewpoint. We start by noting that soil erosion research in Europe is firmly rooted in geomorphology, in contrast to the mainly agronomic foundations of North American erosion research.","PeriodicalId":50049,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Soil and Water Conservation","volume":"14 1","pages":"69A - 74A"},"PeriodicalIF":3.9,"publicationDate":"2023-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"74215524","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"农林科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Prashant Singh, A. Mishra, Smita Jaiswal, Love Kumar, Amit Kumar
{"title":"Comparison of the performances of SALTCALC and LEACHMOD models for simulating the drainage and soil salinity conditions","authors":"Prashant Singh, A. Mishra, Smita Jaiswal, Love Kumar, Amit Kumar","doi":"10.5958/2455-7145.2023.00009.7","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5958/2455-7145.2023.00009.7","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":50049,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Soil and Water Conservation","volume":"3 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.9,"publicationDate":"2023-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"75999908","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"农林科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Salinity and acid sulfate soils of the Vietnam Mekong Delta: Agricultural management and adaptation","authors":"L. Morton, N. Nguyen, M. S. Demyan","doi":"10.2489/jswc.2023.0321A","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2489/jswc.2023.0321A","url":null,"abstract":"O ne of the largest concentrations of acid sulfate soils in the world is found in the Vietnam Mekong River Delta, a large low-lying river plain scarcely above sea level, covering 1.6 million ha (4.0 million ac; figure 1) (van Mensvoort 1996; Vietnam Ministry of Agriculture 1978; Huu et al. 2022). Acid sulfate soils have high concentrations of aluminum (Al), sulfates (SO4 2–), and iron (Fe), and when drained produce sulfuric acid (H2SO4) that reduces soil pH below 4 (van Mensvoort 1996; Huu et al. 2022). These metals accumulate in the topsoil during the tropical dry season and are toxic to plant root growth and development and suppress yields making them some of the most difficult soils in which to grow agricultural crops. Yet, the Vietnam Mekong Delta produces 50% of Vietnam’s rice crop; 95% of rice exports; 65% of aquaculture production; 60% of exported fish; and 70% of the country’s fruit production (Loc et al. 2021). One of the keys to acid sulfate soil productivity is water-soil adaptive management that maintains crop-specific balance between reducing and oxidizing conditions in the plant rootzone at critical vegetative, bloom, and fruit development stages (Hanhart et al. 1997). More than 50 years ago vast areas of this delta were covered permanently by wetlands, brackish lagoons, tidal marshes, and mangrove forests. The prevailing winds of the southwest monsoon season brought predictable continuous heavy rains, a consistent 20-fold increase in Mekong River discharge and extensive prolonged flooding inundating lowlands for months (Adamson et al. 2009; Taylor 2014; Ngan et al. 2018). The monsoon is followed by a dry season when the rains stop and farmers adapt their cropping systems by growing flooded rice (Oryza sativa L.) varieties in the wet season and digging ditches and canals to drain the floodwater and convey fresh water from the Mekong (Song Tien) Lois Wright Morton is professor emeritus of rural sociology, College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, Department of Sociology and Criminal Justice, Iowa State University, Ames, Iowa, United States. Nghia Khoi Nguyen is associate professor in soil and environmental microbiology, College of Agriculture, Can Tho University, Can Tho City, Vietnam. M. Scott Demyan is associate professor of soil and environmental mineralogy, School of Environment and Natural Resources, The Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio, United States. Received March 21, 2023. and Bassac (Song Hau) rivers and their tributaries to their fields for dry season crop irrigation. A changing climate—sea level rise, a stronger and increasingly variable SW monsoon, and more frequent and prolonged drought (Adamson et al. 2009)—in concert with amplified tidal effects and saltwater intrusion reaching 50 to 130 km (31 to 81 mi) upstream into the main rivers since February of 2020 threaten freshwater resources (Loc et al. 2021; World Bank 2022). A growing population, land use decisions, saline soils, loss of mangrove coastal protection, ","PeriodicalId":50049,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Soil and Water Conservation","volume":"66 1","pages":"85A - 92A"},"PeriodicalIF":3.9,"publicationDate":"2023-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"76287142","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"农林科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
J.C. Barnes, A.A. Dayer, A.R. Gramza, M. Sketch, A.M. Dwyer, R. Iovanna
{"title":"Pathways to conservation persistence: Psychosocial drivers of durable grasslands following the Conservation Reserve Program","authors":"J.C. Barnes, A.A. Dayer, A.R. Gramza, M. Sketch, A.M. Dwyer, R. Iovanna","doi":"10.2489/jswc.2023.00215","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2489/jswc.2023.00215","url":null,"abstract":"The Conservation Reserve Program (CRP), the largest private lands conservation program in the United States, has contributed substantially to the health of soil, water, and wildlife of the grasslands in the Great Plains of North America. However, the program’s limited-term contracts offer no guarantee that the vegetation and associated environmental benefits produced by the program will endure when landowners are no longer enrolled. Through a survey of landowners in the southern Great Plains with current or expired CRP contracts, this study explored the role of five pathways previously linked to behavioral persistence—cognitions, motivations, resources, social influences, and behavioral inertia—in grassland persistence after participation in CRP ends. Among landowners with current CRP contracts, intentions to persist with grassland in the future were correlated with positive program experiences, the perceived ease and desirability of keeping their CRP field in grass, and intrinsic motivations to improve the beauty of their field or its value for wildlife or livestock. Reported grassland persistence among landowners with expired CRP contracts was additionally correlated with motivations to improve their field’s soil and water conditions and the availability of natural and material resources. Across both landowner groups, grassland persistence was negatively associated with the importance of financial motivations in landowners’ decision-making and positively associated with normative influences related to how others manage former CRP land in the area. These insights into the drivers of postprogram landowner behavior provide support for the role of cognitive, motivational, social, resource, and behavioral pathways in the durability of grasslands established through CRP and open multiple programmatic and policy opportunities for promoting enduring benefits for the land, people, and wildlife of the Great Plains.","PeriodicalId":50049,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Soil and Water Conservation","volume":"33 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135711577","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"农林科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Environmental justice, climate change, and agriculture","authors":"A. Manale","doi":"10.2489/jswc.2023.0912A","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2489/jswc.2023.0912A","url":null,"abstract":"Climate change will be the most consequential challenge to the global society and especially to agriculture in the coming decades. However, what does climate change have to do with environmental justice (EJ)? Is not EJ supposed to be about protecting disadvantaged communities from toxic chemicals?","PeriodicalId":50049,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Soil and Water Conservation","volume":"86 1","pages":"45A - 49A"},"PeriodicalIF":3.9,"publicationDate":"2023-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"73393897","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"农林科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Analysis of soil water potential characteristics of wheat croplands and apple orchards in an agroforestry ecosystem based on the van Genuchten model","authors":"L. Zhang, Y. Wang","doi":"10.2489/jswc.2023.00038","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2489/jswc.2023.00038","url":null,"abstract":"Due to intense droughts and water shortages, soil water deficit limits agricultural production in arid and semiarid areas, such as China’s Loess Plateau region. Yet the effects of different cover crops on soil water in these areas have received insufficient attention. This study was conducted in the Weibei rainfed highland to investigate soil water potential dynamics in an agroforestry ecosystem comprising winter wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) and apple (Malus domestica) trees over the apple growth period (March to September of 2020). Soil water characteristic curves (SWCCs) of cropland topsoil (0 to 40 cm), orchard topsoil (0 to 40 cm), dark loessial subsoil (40 to 80 cm), and loess parent material (80 to 150 cm) were determined using the centrifuge method and water vapor equilibrium method. The van Genuchten model was used to fit SWCCs and then convert volumetric soil water content monitored in field plots to soil water potential. A quantitative analysis was conducted to evaluate soil water stress in wheat croplands and apple orchards. The model performed well in fitting SWCCs for all tested soils, yielding a robust accuracy (R2 > 0.96). Compared to apple trees, wheat was more threatened by drought. From mid-March to early July, the 0 to 100 cm soil layers of croplands all exhibited high water stress with matric suction pF > 3.98, and unavailable water occurred in the 0 to 20 cm and 0 to 80 cm soil layers in late March to late April and mid-May to mid-July, respectively. Drought threat in apple orchards increased with an increase in tree age. In young orchards (<10 y), high water stress was found only in surface soil layers (0 to 20 cm) in mid-March to late April and late May to early July, which spread to a depth of 70 cm in early June to early July. In mature orchards (10 to 20 y), high water stress was similarly observed in the surface soil layers in mid-March to early May and late May to early July, which extended to the 80 cm depth in late May to early July. In old orchards (>20 y), high water stress initially emerged in the surface soil layers in early April to mid-April and then reached the 70 cm depth in late May to mid-July, whereas unavailable water occurred in the 0 to 60 cm soil layers in mid-June to mid-July. The results indicated that soil water stress zones with low water potential were formed intermittently at different soil depths of apple orchards depending on tree age and growth stage. However, compared to wheat croplands, apple orchards were less influenced by drought stress, so that converting croplands to orchards could alleviate drought threats in the Weibei area.","PeriodicalId":50049,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Soil and Water Conservation","volume":"42 1","pages":"33 - 43"},"PeriodicalIF":3.9,"publicationDate":"2023-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"86549907","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"农林科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
D. Kissel, J. Gaskin, Miguel L. Cabrera, Bert R. Bock, Rattan Lal
{"title":"Agriculture as part of the solution to climate change: Incentivizing the adoption of no-till and cover crops","authors":"D. Kissel, J. Gaskin, Miguel L. Cabrera, Bert R. Bock, Rattan Lal","doi":"10.2489/jswc.2023.0620a","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2489/jswc.2023.0620a","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":50049,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Soil and Water Conservation","volume":"5 1","pages":"103A - 104A"},"PeriodicalIF":3.9,"publicationDate":"2023-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"87312060","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"农林科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Jeffrey E. Herrick, Jonathan M. Maynard, Brandon T. Bestelmeyer, Chelsea J. Carey, Shawn W. Salley, Keith Shepherd, Zachary P. Stewart, Skye A. Wills, Feras M. Ziadat
{"title":"Practical guidance for deciding whether to account for soil variability when managing for land health, agricultural production, and climate resilience","authors":"Jeffrey E. Herrick, Jonathan M. Maynard, Brandon T. Bestelmeyer, Chelsea J. Carey, Shawn W. Salley, Keith Shepherd, Zachary P. Stewart, Skye A. Wills, Feras M. Ziadat","doi":"10.2489/jswc.2023.0706a","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2489/jswc.2023.0706a","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":50049,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Soil and Water Conservation","volume":"141 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135712565","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"农林科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Individual- and county-level factors associated with farmers’ use of 4R Plus nutrient management practices","authors":"J. G. Arbuckle, Lisa A. Schulte, S. Upadhaya","doi":"10.2489/jswc.2023.00002","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2489/jswc.2023.00002","url":null,"abstract":"The 4R Plus approach to agricultural nutrient management—ensuring that the “right source” of nutrients is used at the “right rate,” “right time,” in the “right place,” and combined with appropriate in-field and edge-of-field practices—is posited to lead to win-win outcomes for farmers and the environment. While industry and conservation organizations are promoting the approach, farmers have not yet adopted 4R Plus practices at rates sufficient to meet the state’s nutrient reduction goals. We employed multilevel modeling with survey data from 6,006 Iowa farmers to examine the complex relationships among individual- and county-level social, economic, and ecological factors associated with 4R Plus practice adoption. We found that adoption was associated with clusters of factors at both the individual and county levels. At the individual level, the variable crop area was positively associated with predicting use of all 4R Plus practices except Right Rate. Farmers’ perceived lack of agronomic capacity to address nutrient losses was negatively associated with use of all 4R Plus practices but the Right Source. At the county level, farmers in counties with a higher percentage of rented land were less likely to have adopted Right Time, Right Source, and Edge-of-Field practices. Those farming in counties with a greater average slope were more likely to adopt Plus practices, such as cover crops and terraces. County-level crop insurance coverage rate was negatively associated with In-Field and Edge-of-Field Plus practices. Overall, this study provides quantitative support for qualitative studies that call for conservation programs to simultaneously address factors operating at multiple scales to improve outcomes. Programs that combine local, direct assistance to farmers with broader efforts to remove structural barriers may be more likely to be effective at facilitating conservation adoption than those operating at one scale alone. Specific to 4R Plus programming, efforts that simultaneously help farmers address farm-level capacity barriers and improve policies and programs (e.g., crop insurance) to ensure encouragement rather than hindrance of practice adoption would likely lead to better environmental outcomes.","PeriodicalId":50049,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Soil and Water Conservation","volume":"47 1","pages":"412 - 429"},"PeriodicalIF":3.9,"publicationDate":"2023-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"83251042","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"农林科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
J. Moore, D. Manter, M. Bowman, M. Hunter, E. Bruner, S. McClelland
{"title":"A framework to estimate climate mitigation potential for US cropland using publicly available data","authors":"J. Moore, D. Manter, M. Bowman, M. Hunter, E. Bruner, S. McClelland","doi":"10.2489/jswc.2023.00132","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2489/jswc.2023.00132","url":null,"abstract":"The US agricultural sector is proposed as one opportunity to contribute to greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions reductions—reductions that are needed to limit atmospheric warming to be more in line with the US Nationally Determined Contribution to the Paris Agreement. Improved management of agricultural soils can both mitigate GHG emissions and increase carbon (C) sequestration, but disagreement exists regarding what levels of adoption are possible and to what extent they may mitigate net GHG emissions. In this paper, we provide a framework for setting reasonable, short-term conservation practice adoption targets and quantifying the associated net emissions reductions. Our framework was constructed using USDA-based publicly available inventory data and mitigation potentials from the COMET-Planner tool scaled to nine farm resource regions. The framework includes 2017 levels of conservation practice adoption and two 10-year growth scenarios: business-as-usual (BAU) and accelerated adoption rates. We evaluated six cropland management practices and practices associated with Conservation Reserve Program (CRP) establishment. Based on existing (2017) census data, we estimated that 134.2 million tonnes (Mt) carbon dioxide equivalents (CO2e) per year have been or continue to be reduced through the adoption of conservation management practices on a cumulative total of 133.5 million hectares (Mha) of cropland. Under the BAU scenario, we estimated an additional 6.2 Mha y−1 of adoption could result in a reduction potential of 48.7 Mt CO2e y−1. Under the accelerated scenario, we estimated an additional 13.1 Mha y−1 of adoption could result in a reduction potential of 118.5 Mt of CO2e y−1 over the next 10 years. This framework highlights three key outcomes: (1) agriculture has had a substantial impact on GHG mitigation through existing/historical adoption of six cropland management practices and conversion of lands to the CRP; (2) these shifts in adoption provide an important baseline to make future projections of changes in practice adoption given regional trends and the resulting GHG mitigation potentials; and (3) disaggregating national estimates to the farm resource region level can help to inform and prioritize programs and policies consistent with existing climate goals. Estimates reported here reflect the current state of national modeling efforts and agricultural inventory sources. As new data such as the pending 2022 Ag Census report and model enhancements are made, the framework we outline here can be used to revise and update the estimates to improve accuracy and applicability.","PeriodicalId":50049,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Soil and Water Conservation","volume":"28 1","pages":"193 - 206"},"PeriodicalIF":3.9,"publicationDate":"2022-12-14","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"79270016","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"农林科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}