Effect of Drainage Water Management on Drain Flow.

In many areas of the U.S., profitable farming is dependent on artificial drainage of the soil. A number of management and technical mechanisms exist for managing water in arable fields. One of the more promising practices is controlled drainage. Controlled drainage creates an opportunity to manage drainage systems according to seasonal needs. The objectives of this research were to quantify drain flow volume from two drainage water management strategies: conventional free-drainage (FD) and controlled drainage (CD) in Minnesota, USA. A field study was conducted from 2006-2015 on a drained Havelock loam soil. The field site consisted of two independently drained management zones, 15 and 22 ha, respectively. The project used a time-series statistical analysis approach to evaluate treatments. Daily values were used in all statistical analysis for flow volume. Based on the non-parametric Mann-Kendall test, daily flow volume from FD showed significant increasing trend (7.01x10^-6< Sen Slope <0.0233). No trend was detected from CD for daily flow volume. Based on this data set, and the non-parametric time-series analysis drain flow volume was higher for FD.