Innovative Climate-Smart Water Management System to Reduce Nutrient Loadings at Lake Erie Basin.

Increasing incidences of drought and/or climate extremes in Canada have had serious negative impacts on environment and crop production. Hence, a new “climate-smart” innovative water management approach was developed to achieve economic and environmental sustainability for the Canadian Agricultural Sector. To address these issues, several cost effective integrated reservoir-controlled drainage/sub-irrigation water recycling & nutrient management studies were conducted in southern Ontario to improve water and nutrient management while protecting the environment and ensuring food safety and quality. The objectives of these studies were to determine the effectiveness of the innovative drainage water management systems for reducing nutrient loadings and improving crops performance. The control drainage/subirrigation (CDS)-reservoir water recycling system under no-till field crop production reduced total P and N losses by 12% and 21% relative to the regular free drainage (RFD) system, respectively. This system consistently increased corn and soybean yields relative to RFD system. The drainage control (CD) only system under no-till reduced total P and N losses by 25 % and 16 % compared to RFD. The CD system under conventional till reduced total P and N losses by 13% and 7 % relative to RFD. There was limited yield increase from CD system under both no-till and conventional tillage. The drip irrigation water recycling system for processing tomatoes increased water and nutrient use efficiency by 25 % and 35 % compared to non-irrigated system. This system increased processing tomatoes yields by 41% and 25 % relative to non-irrigated system under sandy loam and clay loam, respectively.