%0 Journal Article
%T Nitrogen Leaching Loss Estimation From Paddy Soil in the Taihu Lake Region of China By A Newly Developed Simple Model - Nitrogen Leaching Loss Estimation From Paddy Soil in the Taihu Lake Region of China By A Newly Developed Simple Model - Open Access Pub
%A Fang Fang
%A Guo-Xiang Wang
%A Hai-Lin Zhang
%A Han Meng
%A Li-Min Zhang
%A Shi-Jun Li
%A Wei-Ming Shi
%A Wen-Ming Xie
%A You Ma
%J OAP | Home | Journal of Agronomy Research | Open Access Pub
%D 2018
%X Nitrogen leaching as a direct pathway of N loss from agricultural land can negatively affect groundwater and surface water quality. However, a simple and efficient method for nitrogen leaching loss estimation is still inefficient. In this study, an exponential model was developed using the experimental data from a two-year field experiment conducted in the Taihu Lake region of China to simulate the N leaching from the paddy soil. The results showed the leached N was in the range of 5.66 to 8.45 kg N/ha during the whole rice season, which was accounted for 1.7%-2.1% of the applied N. A good agreement between the measured and model predicted results for N leaching loss was observed, suggesting the validity of the established model. The model was further validated with the data of other studies in other regions. The results demonstrated this model is able to simulate the N leaching loss accurately and can provide a beneficial tool for users to predict N leaching loss in paddy soil. DOI10.14302/issn.2639-3166.jar-19-3097 Rice is the most important crop in China, which makes up 43.7% of the national grain production 1. The Taihu Lake region (TLR) located in the Yangtze River delta is one of the five major rice production regions in China 2, 3, 4. To achieve high grain yields, farmers in TLR often apply large amount of fertilizers, especially nitrogen (N) fertilizer 5. It is reported that the optimal level of fertilizer N was from 185 kg/ha to 270 kg/ha in TLR, however, the average N fertilizer input was over 350 kg/ha in TLR 6, 7, 8. Therefore, excess N in paddy soils will get lost to surrounding water bodies, and result in eutrophication and groundwater contamination in this region 9. Leaching is one main pathway of N losses in paddy soil, which normally accounts for 0.1%-4.9% of the applied N 3, 10, 11. The leached N can increase the groundwater nitrate content significantly and deteriorate the groundwater quality seriously 12, 13, 14, 15, 16. Therefore, the N leaching in paddy soil should be controlled effectively. However, to control the N leaching, the amount of leached N should be measured first. At the present time, the amount of leached N is estimated with the volume of leachate and the N concentration in leachate at a certain interval (usually at 7 days or 10 days) during the whole rice growing season 1, 3, 17. Although this method was widely used, it is tedious and time consuming with low efficiency. Therefore, a more efficient method is necessary to overcome those shortcoming. Mathematical modeling has been proven to be a powerful tool in
%U https://www.openaccesspub.org/jar/article/1218