Blind Inlets as Conservation Practices to Improve Water Quality

摘要

Water quality is a pressing issue in modern agriculture, with the focus on nutrients and pesticides polluting bodies of water. The Conservation Effects Assessment Project (CEAP) is a U.S. Department of Agriculture multi-agency effort to evaluate the environmental benefits of conservation practices and to develop new and/or modify existing conservation practices to manage the agricultural landscape for environmental stewardship. In the U.S. Midwest, small closed depressions (potholes) can be productive for farming if drained. The tile riser is a vertical perforated pipe used as a common practice to drain these pothole depressions (Figure 1). However, the tile risers do not provide any other benefits such as filtering the surface runoff; thus, fine sediments and soluble pollutants end up moving through the riser and subsurfacedrainage uie, ana into me ouuei cnannei or ditch. Blind inlets are an alternative conservation practice that can drain the pothole depressions with added benefits (Figure 1). Daily farming operations can be conducted over the blind inlets, including tillage, planting, and harvesting. Furthermore, since the blind inlets are filled with a combination of fine and coarse materials (Figure 2), this bed serves as a filter for sediments and increases the tortuosity of the draining water; thus, sediment runoffand flow rate are reduced. Since losses of nutrients and pesticides are impacted by sediment losses and flow, it is anticipated that surface losses of nutrients and pesticides are impacted by the blind inlet.