Modeling water and nitrogen dynamics from processing tomatoes under different management scenarios in the San Joaquin Valley of California

Abstract

Study region: The Southern San Joaquin Valley (SSJV), California. Four representative soil types were evaluated. Study focus: Evaluation of regional scale hydrology and nitrogen (N) fate and transport requires a robust modeling framework that considers critical local scale environmental conditions and crop root zone physical processes. Two widely used yet conceptually and mechanistically different models, HYDRUS(2D/3D) and SWAT (Soil and Water Assessment Tool), were used to investigate water and N dynamics in processing tomato fields across a range of soil types and management scenarios over a 30-year period in the SSJV. New hydrological insights for the region: This study implements a framework to evaluate a regional scale model against a field scale model and provides a framework for assessing percolation and N transport results from regional scale simulations in the absence of extensive field observations. Field scale models developed in HYDRUS (2D/3D) produced similar results to a regional-scale SWAT model in four specific soils in terms of responses to percolation and N losses as a function of varying N fertilizer and irrigation management practices. This model-to-model agreement at the local scale provides confidence in region-scale hydrological and N fate and transport findings, particularly in the absence of extensive field observations. Both models suggest that promoting conservation practices targeting the optimization of irrigation and fertilizer-N management would have a large impact in protecting regional groundwater quality.

Keywords

• Nitrogen losses
• Groundwater quality
• HYDRUS (2D/3D)
• Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT)